@ToughLoveforX

Crowd Sourced Print Centric Innovation

2011-09-11T09:43:00.000-04:00

A couple of days ago an interesting thing happened on social media. It started on Twitter then moved to G+.

On twitter there is a group of us, @GraingerEd in Canada, @Ddrrnt in Oregon, that have been chatting over the last year or so about the problems in education. Sean Grainger (@graingered ) is a leading educator in Alberta. He did a brilliant post on Bullying.

About a week or so ago, we seemed to have hit an inflection point. @menghe a brilliant designer joined our little band. It's an under appreciated fact that Brilliant - not pedestrian - graphic design is the defensible value. After a couple of days of back and forth on twitter, and then a real focused conversation at G+ , Menghe presented this poster on Bullying.

If things go as planned, A printed version of this piece will be available at Jason Pinto's booth some time during Graph Expo.

Print Centric Innovation

As we chatted more about the poster Menghe did, it seems that we may have stumbled on a product that could do well while doing some good.

Another member of our little band is @Sandyhubbard . We've been having a long back and forth on Twitter about Print as the Medium of Common Sense. The fact is the Print medium is slow. It sits quietly in the background waiting for the user to engage. Unlike "social media" it does not create the expectation of a response Now. All you need to do is compare the image you find on this screen with a printed version available at the show to prove the point to yourself.

But the point is to do well in the service of doing good.

The format of the image should enable non profit organizations to get their message out and still allow magazines to earn money from placing the ad. Each of the twitter persona and QR should be easy to sell to corporations also trying to do well. If the charge for an ad is $2000, each position could be sold for a minimum of $500 or more.

Do well. Do good. is the best way to integrate social media into Print.

Stay tuned for more Print Centric Innovations to #HelpPrintThrive.

UPDATE: Sept 15

It turned out that things broke just the right way. @raffel stepped up to get us through the last mile at the show. The other piece was quick response from @HPIndigo. Short story it was printed at GraphExpo yesterday. For the non printing nerds, GraphExpo is the biggest Print Industry show in the USA... at least for now.

It says to me that Crowd Sourced Design can be couple with Crowd Sourced Manufacturing. Of course this is a tiny example, depending an the caring of many individuals.

But it seems to me it demonstrates what is now becoming possible.

Moved to Twitter and Print in the Communication Ecology blog

2010-08-25T06:56:00.004-04:00

Since I started this blog I've used it to gather data points to help me clarify what I think are the next steps for Print. Around the end of March 2010, I found that twitter is a better tool for that purpose.

If you're interested in my blabla or my 2¢ you can find me at @ToughLoveforX I'm now focused on Print in the Communications Ecology.

{ The following was originally posted March 13, 2010 }
Yesterday I got an email from an on the ground printer in the States.

She said:
I had been wondering about the lack of input from you lately (you used to be EVERYWHERE!) – glad to be getting your tweets!

I said:
Thanks for the email. "EVERYWHERE?" yikes! Can you imagine what is was like back in the day working with me. I never shut up.

A short explanation about the blog . From where I sit, I really do think the "tipping point" has been reached in Print and from here on in, much less panic and much more money. Hooray!
But it's a bit less interesting as the pieces fall back into place. My real passion as you might be able to tell from my tweets is education. Primarily in the creation of at risk kids in really broken high schools. As an example the average grad rate in NYC is 63% and people look upon that as a great victory.

The thing about education is NOT about feel good. It's about making money for printers who get it. Marketing for globals is a loser because the margins are so low and will continue to be so low. At the local level there's more opp, but with the competition from on line and the chains - Alpha, Staples, etc. the margins are going to stay tight.

Right now there is a huge amount of money being poured into education. Also a huge disruption is going on in that market that opens up opportunities for smaller, faster, smarter printers.

Lots of commercial people think I'm all about the feel good. Suffice it to say that one of the reasons I was able to retire was by investing in print related companies. Just as examples, in the last year Consolidated is up 125%, McClatchey newspapers up 800%, Gannett up 300%, Oce up around 100%. When I say print ain't dead, my data points are the stock prices.

Seth Goodin and the Printernet

2010-05-08T18:54:00.002-04:00

Seth Godin " There's room in the market for 100,000 profitable micro-magazines" http://ilnk.me/275d >Biz case for printernet.

Having a very specific audience (call it a tribe)
Enabling that tribe to connect by sharing the ideas in the magazine among them, as well as supporting it with a forum or blog
Containing ads that are relevant to that audience
Being longer than 140 characters or even a blog post, so significant ideas can be exposed in detail

There's room in the market for 100,000 profitable micro-magazines. Why not have one about Aruba, for example? If all the people who vacation in Aruba could read about the island in detail every month, read about restaurants, resorts and politics, for free, in an easy to share format... Multiply this by every destination, every interest group, every type of profession (how about a micro-magazine for ethnobiologists?)

#Printernet is massively parallel manufacture of Print output. 50,000,000+ Print pieces w/a minimal carbon footprint. http://ilnk.me/27d1

“Massive parallel manufacturing with standards-based interfaces, real time production information and easy access for everyone. Each printer — the combination of the machinery and the intelligence that manages the machinery — is a print output node. Each node is both part of the network and self-sufficient. When the nodes are working together mass customization of print product becomes commonplace at previously impossible speeds and quantities.”

So what's up with PrintCafe? Not pretty it seems.

2010-04-18T04:13:00.002-04:00

So yesterday I got this tweet from EliotNessCyLab

@ToughLoveforX The 'rest of the story' about Printcafe: www.PrintcafeSecuritiesFraud.com

Then this morning I got an email. A section of it is reproduced below:

1) The victims of the Printcafe securities fraud were:

a) Creo which lost between $75 and $100 million and was attacked by Cenveo's Bob Burton (who gobbled up Banta instead), [Creo chose suicide-by-Kodak rather than suicide- by-Cenveo],

b) the former owners of the acquired software companies -- Hagen, Logic, Printsmith, PSI -- who were shortchanged by $51 million when PCAF shares were split 66:1,

c) the career employees who built the aforementioned companies, HUNDREDS of whom lost their careers as PCAF had to slash and burn as it abandoned the successful software products and pursued "e-commerce" that did not exist,

d) ALL printers nationwide, who lost the benefits of competition as Printcafe/EFI formed a virtual monopoly, (a monopoly even more complete now that EFI has gobbled up ePACE),

e) ALL printers nationwide, who endured higher prices and diminished service from Printcafe/EFI,

f) the public and private investors who had lost a grand total of $250 million (that's one-quarter of a BILLION) by the year 2003 when PCAF imploded (and only got about $50 million back from EFI),

g) the Aileron hedge fund investors who never heard about the Printcafe fraud from the printing industry's 'journalists' and therefore invested with Guttman,

h) Carnegie Mellon which never heard about the Printcafe fraud from the printing industry's 'journalists' and therefore hired Guttman and has retained him lo these many years.

It's money with the wrong dna. (originally posted May 25,2009)

2010-04-17T06:54:00.000-04:00

Funny money thinks it has all the answers. It forgets that its replication is based on a rising market and its arrogance on a short memory. If something crashes it's usually because "the economy is blablabla." If money gets burned in the Print space, it's because "the internet balabala and the End of Print." That's why Cenveo closed Anderson, that's why Boundary Capital is closing outlets all over the UK and why Zell took the Tribune into bankruptcy.

Meanwhile David Black is doing very nicely with newspapers in Southwest Canada/Northwest USA and The Color Company just replaced Fedex Kinko's in London and is also growing nicely.

In the States we have this thing about "Go West! Young Man." Maybe the Color Company should "Go North!" They could pick through the debris and find those smart, ever resilient, persistent Printers and click them on to their printernet. Then they could move to Australasia and do the same. Then maybe they could give AlphaGraphics a real run for their money in the States.

Then they could both fight it out with our homegrown good guys to see who will be the Starbucks of the Printernet.

"Earning" money by getting transaction fees from your VARs may work in finance. It's not sustainable in the real economy. Earning money from your VARs through value given, value received transactions is a different business model.

The End of Print? Hah! More likely it's the end of Funny Money poking it's nose into places it doesn't belong.

Prontaprint accused of supplier 'kickbacks'
@ comment posted at printweek.com

"Firms that want to supply Prontaprint had better be careful.

If anybody from Boundary Capital or ODC rings you up and says 'you can supply our franchisees but you'll have to grease our palms first, by the way your not allowed to speak to anyone about it' just remember that the guys that pay the bills namely the franchisees won't touch you with a bargepole if they find out about it. If we find out your doing it already we'll tell each other. Kickbacks mean WE HAVE TO PAY MORE. Be careful what you get yourselves into.

We want to deal with firms that don't give kickbacks.

Time for a change. In the Blog and in Print.

2010-03-13T05:46:00.003-05:00

{ Originally posted March 13, 2009 }
If you're interested in my blabla or my 2¢ you can find me at @ToughLoveforX
I'm now focused on Print in the Communications Ecology.

Yesterday I got an email from an on the ground printer in the States.

She said:
I had been wondering about the lack of input from you lately (you used to be EVERYWHERE!) – glad to be getting your tweets!

I said:
Thanks for the email. "EVERYWHERE?" yikes! Can you imagine what is was like back in the day working with me. I never shut up.

A short explanation about the blog . From where I sit, I really do think the "tipping point" has been reached in Print and from here on in, much less panic and much more money. Hooray!
But it's a bit less interesting as the pieces fall back into place. My real passion as you might be able to tell from my tweets is education. Primarily in the creation of at risk kids in really broken high schools. As an example the average grad rate in NYC is 63% and people look upon that as a great victory.

The thing about education is NOT about feel good. It's about making money for printers who get it. Marketing for globals is a loser because the margins are so low and will continue to be so low. At the local level there's more opp, but with the competition from on line and the chains - Alpha, Staples, etc. the margins are going to stay tight.

Right now there is a huge amount of money being poured into education. Also a huge disruption is going on in that market that opens up opportunities for smaller, faster, smarter printers.

Lots of commercial people think I'm all about the feel good. Suffice it to say that one of the reasons I was able to retire was by investing in print related companies. Just as examples, in the last year Consolidated is up 125%, McClatchey newspapers up 800%, Gannett up 300%, Oce up around 100%. When I say print ain't dead, my data points are the stock prices.

The Textbook Medium is The Message Of High School Education in the States

2010-02-26T14:14:00.003-05:00

The inconvenient truth is that in High School education in the States approved textbooks supply the standards for education.

There is no longer any doubt in my mind that textbooks are now entering the tipping point into something new. It seems that education is traveling along the same trajectory.

Our usual focus is on the textbook as print. Today let's take a look at the political economy of education in the service of getting a more nuanced view.

In Rhode Island

All teachers fired at R.I. school. Will that happen elsewhere? { CSM http://ilnk.me/1c08 }

All teachers fired at R.I. school. { CSM http://ilnk.me/1c08 } "This will be a canary in the coal mine,”

Rhode Island is now ground zero for reforming America’s worst-performing schools { CSM http://ilnk.me/1c08 }

The game changer is

US Secretary of #Education Arne Duncan applauded the Rhode Island decision this week." { CSM http://ilnk.me/1c08 } about 3 hours ago

in Texas:

Texas "House Bill 2488 – the “open source” #textbook bill – is a watershed piece of legislation" http://ilnk.me/1bf6

Open Source” Textbooks Are Reason for Grave Concern in Texas http://ilnk.me/1bf6 ( The Political Economy of #Education)

The game changer

Open Source” #Textbooks Are Reason for Grave Concern in Texas http://ilnk.me/1bf6 --> " weakening the duties of the Board,"

If you still can't get clarity on one future for textbooks . . .

2010-02-25T07:21:00.004-05:00

It's now clear to everyone that textbooks in their present form are over. A bit like a zombie bank waiting to be reorganized. Here's one example of what's next.

Remixable textbooks by expert authors. Free online and affordable offline. http://ilnk.me/1bc2 me: Read for Free. Pay for Print. Go Print !

1,000 students 30 schools in Spring '09; 40,000 students 400 colleges in the fall 2009 used free Flat World textbooks http://ilnk.me/1bc1

I bet if you did the growth chart it would look like a hockey stick.

IBM + Ricoh v Xerox v HP v ?? for MPS

2010-02-23T07:07:00.000-05:00

Came across this piece this AM. So now it's IBM + Ricoh and Xerox(ACS) and HP. Wonder how Canon(Oce) is responding.

In any case it's all good for print. And my print-centric IRA.

IBM and Ricoh combine to help reduce print-related costs | TradingMarkets.com:

"IT company
IBM (NYSE: IBM PowerRating) and Ricoh (Nasdaq-OTCBB: RICOY PowerRating), a printer manufacturer, announced yesterday that they have partnered to develop an advanced device and printing management system which offers organisations the opportunity to reduce their costs and improve service availability."

What's up with Appleton Coated, NewPage, Sappi trying to get higher tariffs on Chinese paper.

2010-02-22T08:42:00.005-05:00

To be clear all the info below comes from folks who represent Asia Pulp & Paper, the leading exporter of coated paper from China and Indonesia. It's fair to say they have skin in the game. But I consider the source and then see what makes sense to me.

To me it sounds like a couple of companies are trying to protect their market. That's not a problem. If I were a big company I would do the same thing. They do it because it's good for their company. If I were a shareholder that's precisely what I would expect.

But, please. No bullshit about good for America. Getting the United Steel Workers to join their suit, makes tactical sense, but give me a break.

Anyways here's what's on my radar so far.

The U.S. Department of Commerce (DOC) is investigating accusations that Chinese and Indonesian paper makers have received unfair subsidies from their governments and dumped certain types of coated paper on the U.S. market. The DOC will issue an important preliminary decision on subsidies on March 1

Over at Dead Tree Editions Blog ,whose insights and info I've grown to respect. He says:

If you think prices for coated paper have declined a lot recently, hang on to your hats. A bigger drop may be just around the corner.

I'm not sure about Appleton and NewPage but am told that

"Sappi is a South African multinational corporation. Sappi is gearing up operations in Asia, while it is closing plants in the U.S.

Of course there is the whining about subsidies for foreign paper. I don't have the details handy, but I'm pretty sure my readers remember the tax credits the paper companies got from the fed for smart business decisions to take advantage of the rules.

To get the full story, Dead Tree does a serious rundown at Both Sides in Asian-Paper Debate Are Lobbying U.S. Printers

U.S. industry received about $9 billion in black liquor credits during 2009. NewPage and SAPPI received more than $400 million last year in black liquor credits, which critics claim is an abuse of a program that was intended to encourage production of new, environmentally friendly fuels.

I have no problem with the companies. They are supposed to play by the rules to maximize shareholder value. I do however, have lots of problems with a Congress that make rules without a full consideration of the unintended consequences.

Bottom line is this kind of using the government to protect margins and markets really has to stop. It's what got us into the trouble we are in.

For the more reasoned and nuanced explanation, I suggest a read through Super Capitalism by Robert Reich. or you can watch a 10 minute vid here or the 60 minute video here.

No more bullshit at Xerox. Ursula M. Burns in the New York Times

2010-02-22T07:35:00.005-05:00

In 1969, Neil Postman made a presentation at the National Convention for the Teachers of English [NCTE], November 28, 1969, Washington, D.C.. The title is "Bullshit and the Art of Crap-Detection"

From what I think I see, Ursula M Burns knows all about it.

Xerox’s New Chief Tries to Redefine Its Culture
“Terminal niceness,” is how she describes an aspect of Xerox’s culture, during her all-hands speech. “We are really, really, really nice.”
Maybe the “Xerox family,” she says, should act a bit more like a real family.
“When we’re in the family, you don’t have to be as nice as when you’re outside of the family,” she says. “I want us to stay civil and kind, but we have to be frank — and the reason we can be frank is because we are all in the same family.”
Nods of recognition ripple across the audience.
“We know it. We know what we do,” she continues, describing meetings where some people present and others just listen. “And then the meeting ends, and we leave and go, ‘Man, that wasn’t true.’ I’m like, ‘Why didn’t you say that in the meeting?’ ”

Why I wish HP would spin off the Print piece.

2010-02-20T09:21:00.003-05:00

I got to the following by following links from my ChangeForge daily email alert.

From ONN.TV

A look at HP’s quarterly numbers, by division
Hewlett-Packard Co.’s 25-percent jump in net income in its November-January quarter was driven by better numbers in most of the technology company’s major divisions. Here are some highlights on those divisions:

– Services: Revenue slipped 1 percent to $8.7 billion. Operating profit rose 27 percent to $1.4 billion.

– Printers and ink (Imaging and Printing Group): Revenue rose 4 percent to $6.2 billion. Revenue from ink and other supplies was up 1 percent. Ink is one of HP’s biggest moneymakers. The division’s operating profit was flat at $1.1 billion.

– Computer servers and storage (Enterprise Storage and Servers): Revenue rose 11 percent to $4.4 billion. Operating profit rose 36 percent to $552 million.

– Personal computers (Personal Systems Group): Revenue increased 20 percent to $10.6 billion. Operating profit jumped 22 percent to $530 million.

– Software: Revenue was flat at $878 million. Operating profit rose 19 percent to $167 million

– Financial services: Revenue increased 13 percent to $719 million.

Printers and Ink ( Imaging and Printing Group) are the wrong buckets. I don't know much about the ink business, but my bet is that margins are only going lower. On a global scale it might turn out to continue to be the great cash generator as before. If I had to bet on it, I wouldn't.

But the presence of the Indigo and now the digital web presses say to me that HP may have a very defensible position in the under appreciated Print industry. Suffice it to say that my Print-centric IRA is well over 100% up since I started managing it about a year ago.

If HP gave me a way to invest in the Print piece instead of all the other complicated opaque (2me) businesses, it would be grand.

Another step towards a Robust Printernet. Press Sense gets new CEO.

2010-02-19T11:30:00.002-05:00

The quote from the Press Release:

“With growing demand for Business Flow Automation throughout the marketplace, our intensified focus upon this critical region is paramount to our worldwide success,” notes Press-sense CEO Shlomo Ben David. “Amir’s extensive sales and executive management experience compliments our growth strategy and is a valuable addition to our management team. We anticipate his impact will accentuate our results in these regions. ”

Amir's dna is from IT not Print.

Amir Rosentuler’s experience is evidence of a results-driven management executive with more than 20 years experience in sales management and business development. With more than 10 years with NASDAQ software companies, he has exhibited strong P&L management, and cross-company strategic project management skills. Prior to Press-sense, Amir was the General Manager and Vice President of International Sales for Magic Software (a leader in enterprise application development and integration software) where he constructed and implemented their new turnaround strategy.

Amir also held several senior positions in IBM, and several senior management positions in Novell, as well as senior sales management and channel distribution management positions at Computer Associates.

IT dna is precisely what's needed to pull together a stable, resilient Printernet.

“Massive parallel manufacturing with standards-based interfaces, real time production information and easy access for everyone. Each printer — the combination of the machinery and the intelligence that manages the machinery — is a print output node. Each node is both part of the network and self-sufficient. When the nodes are working together mass customization of print product becomes commonplace at previously impossible speeds and quantities.”

Com Color v Color Qube. I'm thinking Com Color for Education

2010-02-19T08:13:00.003-05:00

No real information about the Color Cube has gotten on my radar. Not sure what that means, but ComColor does keep popping up.

I pay attention when I see a tweet from @artpost

Riso ComColor Review http://bit.ly/1bfBlB

Which got me to Art's print4pay Hotel's "MFP Solutions Blog." I decided not to put in any snippets, as it's a short post and a very good read.

Instead I would like to share my tweets, which I hope will allow you to see what I'm seeing.

"To me the ComColor's mantra should be "Print Shop in Box", ( http://ilnk.me/1ab2 @Artpost ) Congrats to @RisoPrinter

"a 32 page booklet (saddle stitched) in about 30 seconds" ( http://ilnk.me/1ab2 @Artpost ) 30 kids x 30 secs = 15 minutes for textbooklets.

32 full color booklets x $.035 per page = $ 1.12 for a 1 to 1 textbooklet for at risk middle schoolers from @RisoPrinter http://ilnk.me/1ab2

Gosh I wish HP were a pure play on Print

2010-02-18T11:08:00.001-05:00

The thing is it's too complicated for my IRA. Print centric has been doing just fine and as they say "focus, focus, focus."

Anyway, just one more datapoint on how HP could be a Printernet all by itself. The money phrase

industry’s largest personal publishing ecosystem

HP Press Kit: HP at PMA 2010
"At the 2010 Photo Marketing Association (PMA) tradeshow, HP is showcasing new digital photography and personal publishing solutions designed to accelerate the analog to digital transformation of the photo industry.

With the industry’s largest personal publishing ecosystem, HP and its solutions help retailers and print service providers to profitably grow their photo offerings and enable consumers to capture and access dynamic content where they want, when they want, how they want – and bring it to life through the power of print."

I bet IPEX is when Print tips. Have you read today's post at OutputLinks?

2010-02-16T09:17:00.002-05:00

Frequent visitors to the blog know that I think the tipping point has already passed. But I'm just a blogger, so what do I really know. On the other hand, my print centric IRA has been doing just fine, so at the end of the day, what do I really care.

Anyway, this morning I got to see the Andy and Julie Plata talking about IPEX at OutputLinks.
Here's the link:

My personal fav snippet is:

a seminar area for 30 national and international not-for-profit organizations to exhibit at the event.

To me it says that there is a small, but gathering consensus that the growth path for the industry is not marketing to sell more widgets. Rather it is using the awesome power of Print to do well by doing good.

Just a few of the many other money snippets follow:

All the presenters seemed to be preparing their exhibits with the expected better economic conditions for 2010 in mind.

In fact Ipex 2010 will be the world’s largest English speaking print conference. It takes place every four years and will attract visitors from over 160 countries and exhibitors from almost 40 countries to Birmingham, UK.

A good “ignition indicator” was exhibitors like Océ, Pitney Bowes, Canon, HP, Fujifilm, Ricoh and Konica Minolta who had dramatically increased the size of their booths over the 2006 Conference.

Another “ignition indicator” is the fact that the show is almost 95% sold!

Program like the My Ipex, the Great Print Debates, the Printer’s Profit Zone, and the Knowledge Center are good examples of no-charge programs that will enhance the visitor experience.

Somebody really should get in touch with Amy Halford at Best Buy

2010-02-11T07:32:00.003-05:00

The other day I was in town and passed a Best Buy. I noticed a poster with a QR code in the window. This morning I found Best Buy reveals mobile strategy - Mobile Commerce Daily .

Mobile Commerce Daily’s Giselle Tsirulnik interviewed Amy Halford, senior digital brand manager of interactive marketing and emerging media, Richfield, MN. Here is what she had to say.

First the money paragraph.

Multichannel integration and measurement are the two biggest challenges. Mapping out our organization’s entire digital ecosystem and taking advantage of all the touch points in a relevant way is very challenging both in its size and complexity.

Amy doesn't need to be educated. She gets it. Just help her solve her problem.

Other snippets follow:

It’s very easy to be distracted by shiny objects, but if you stay grounded on delivering against the customer’s need, regardless of the technology employed, there’s a greater likelihood for success.

Our chief marketing officer is a self proclaimed “noisy advocate” for the mobile platform. We see mobile as not only a commerce opportunity but an opportunity to learn more about our customers and serve them better across the enterprise. Our approach is to test frequently, learn quickly, and scale appropriately.

We also recognize the 1:1 opportunity of the mobile channel and as we develop that capability, mobile is a key means for allowing customers to get more customized messaging and offers should they choose to do so.

We have built several SMS subscription databases including our Best Buy Deal of the Week, which we promote and send each week in both English and Spanish.

To support our stores at a local level, we’re executing a district-level SMS pilot enabling those stores to send news, alerts, events & offers specific to their store – to the customers that shop in their store.

Anyone else notice that Kodak closed over $6 last week. How come?

2010-02-08T06:40:00.002-05:00

Since about October EK has been sitting at around $4 while the other printernet stocks have been moving nicely upward. But starting around the January 25 on unusual volume it got to $6.94. Since then it retreated to $6.08 on Friday. Clearly something's up.

My take is that the KKR dna is starting to manifest. The defensible value going forward for Kodak is photos, not printing. Kodak Gallery has many millions of users who have stored high resolution images on the web. These are the people who created "The Kodak Moment."

On January 14th, Gail Nickel-Kailing continued the convo at Print CEO about a possible Kodak Heidelberg deal.
Although much of the focus was on the NexPress, I said, "

Just last month the Prosper has finally come to market with the first announced deal by Consolidated in Texas. If the TOC and price points that Kodak has announced for the Prosper bear out, it could well become the low cost ink jet web output machine on the street.

Consider what a Kodak/Heidelberg deal might mean on the offset side. Kodak’s Prinergy seems to now be focused on seamless workflow from offset to the Prosper.

Given Kodak’s lead in the offset workflow and Heidelberg’s lead in the offset output device it sounds like a synergy to me.

Today Kodak rolls out ambitious plans for mobile appears at Mobile Marketer.
My favorite snippet is

Since December 2009, consumers have been able to use their mobile devices to interact with the Kodak Times Square billboard in New York City.
This is a one-of-kind experience in Times Square. Consumers can email a photo to Kodak@aerva.com, and once the photo is approved, they’ll receive a second email containing a code.
When they’re ready to see their picture on the big screen, they simply text the code to the number provided and the photo will appear at the next opportunity.

Full disclosure : Long Kodak.

More on textbooks :Nokia, Pearson partner for mobile education program in China.

2010-02-03T09:56:00.001-05:00

Telco expansion is a powerful engine of new growth. (FYI the other one is a resugrent Auto Industry. Notice what happened to Sirius the last couple of days? )

My bet is that as soon as a Print global makes the telco connection, my portfolio will be even happier than it's been this last year and the high school dropout problem will be solved much sooner, rather than later.

In any case, here's another data point from today. Keep in mind that Nokia has, I believe, 40% of the global handset market and Pearson is Pearson.

Nokia, Pearson partner for mobile education program - Mobile Marketer - Content:
"The two companies partnered to help the Mobiledu education program appeal to more consumers. Nokia said that it believes the combination of Pearson’s content and its Mobiledu service will offer an even more compelling proposition for customers and partners in the future.

Since its launch, in 2007 Mobiledu has attracted 20 million subscribers in China, with 1.5 million people actively using the service each month."

iPad, shmiPad "students remain big fans of printed books"

2010-02-03T07:26:00.004-05:00

In today's Wall Street Journal there's a story about most of the big textbook publishers getting religion . . again. The silly meme is that Print is Dead. This time it plays out with the iPad. Full story:

Major textbook publishers have struck deals with software company ScrollMotion Inc. to adapt their textbooks for the electronic page, as the industry embraces a hope that digital devices such as Apple Inc.'s iPad will transform the classroom.

Not surprisingly, the usual cast of characters are moving together.

"People have been talking about the impact of technology on education for 25 years. It feels like it is really going to happen in 2010," said Rik Kranenburg, group president of higher education for the education unit of McGraw-Hill Cos. and one of the publishers involved in the project.

Other publishers include Houghton Mifflin Harcourt K-12, which is a unit of Education Media & Publishing Group Ltd.; Pearson PLC's Pearson Education, and Washington Post Co.'s Kaplan Inc., known for its test-prep and study guides.

But there is an inconvenient truth.

Maureen McMahon, president of Kaplan Publishing, said a recent Kaplan study showed that students remain big fans of printed books but that they would be more receptive to e-textbooks on portable digital devices.

The problem with textbooks is not that they are printed. The problem is they are too slow and expensive. Like many globals, they ignore the facts and buzz substitutes for reality. Best guess is that Kaplan will figure it out first. They generate most of the profit for the Washington Post anyways.

Consider study guides with QR codes instead of textbooks.
Plus you can get all those great analytics. Plus you can print it out on your MFP and take it to the local coffee shop to discuss with your friends.

Clickable Print and the evolution of the print medium

2010-01-27T08:08:00.004-05:00

30,000 feet
It's pretty clear that print will start growing as QR and other 2d codes are incoporated in print product. One might say that clickable print is both a table of contents for content on the web and the off ramp to present web content in physical space.

10,000 feet
The view changes depending on the focus. My focus is education with a side focus on health and government. I think there is much to learn from marketing, but advertising and marketing are still too competitive and disruptive. It's hard for printers to add value. Education and health need the insights of marketing and the technology we provide.

On the ground
It's too complicated for any general statements or insights. That's where each PSP has to figure it out for themselves.

I've started a twitter persona to store various use cases from 10,000 feet. You can follow @clickableprint

Use Cases from 10,000 feet
PD | refers to Professional Development. It's the low hanging fruit in K-12 education.

PD | Education 2029 ? Compare and contrast: vid Kaplan Univ. http://ilnk.me/1657 View from Natl Assoc of Scholars Http://ilnk.me/NAS .

PD | "rather than try to train better leaders (teachers) we need to reboot the concept" http://ilnk.me/1662 - Poughkeepsie Day School

PD | Education 2029 ? Compare and contrast: vid Kaplan Univ. http://ilnk.me/1657 View from Natl Assoc of Scholars Http://ilnk.me/NAS .

Edu | Worst Idea To Promote Parent Involvement Ever" http://tinyurl.com/ydzaeer || ClckPr to send Mom an SMS when non compliance occurs.

'Meet the Press' transcript for January 24, 2010 http://ilnk.me/165e || Could be great in clickable print for civic class.

Another consolidation? Quad to Buy World Color. RRD gets a run for the money.

2010-01-26T09:36:00.000-05:00

Printer Quad Graphics Expected to Buy World Color Press - WSJ.com:

"Privately held Quad/Graphics Inc. of the U.S. is expected to acquire Canadian rival World Color Press Inc. for roughly $1.3 billion to $1.4 billion, said people familiar with the matter, in a deal that would create North America's second-largest commercial printer by sales, behind industry giant R.R. Donnelley & Sons Co.

Under the plan, these people said, shareholders of Toronto-listed World Color, which prints such magazines as Sports Illustrated and Rolling Stone, as well as the Crate & Barrel catalog and Yellow Book directory, would get a 40% stake in the newly combined company. The new company would then list on a U.S. stock exchange, they said, in effect bringing Quad/Graphics, whose clients include Newsweek, GQ and the L.L. Bean catalog, to the public market for the first time since its founding in 1971."

Now that we know where Print fits, what's next?

2010-01-26T06:18:00.002-05:00

It's become pretty clear that Print fits into the emerging communication ecology as being the on and off ramp to Web Squared. As the web becomes the internet of things, Print is the table of contents.

Now it's just a matter of following who is going to get what in the ensuing land grab. But that's for a different post.

Today, visual search got back on my radar. My bet is that is the end of game of the next 10 or 15 years. It will be fascinating to see how that plays out. Imagine what that could mean for education, health and government. It will probably also be pretty neat for marketing.

It started yesterday with a couple of tweets between me and Ricoh Innovations Labs.

jamois RT @jasonpinto: Excellent application of QR Codes described by @ToughLoveForX: http://ilnk.me/1698

@jamois http://aha.sh/U - scan, author qr codes. Plus analytics. Social networking. iPhone, Mac, Windows. oh & FREE || pretty cool.

jamois @ToughLoveforX "http://aha.sh/U -...qr codes....FREE || pretty cool." - thx but check out what comes next: "visual search" http://aha.sh/VS

Me:
@jamois brilliant! --->http://aha.sh/VS | Until it's ready for prime time QR? BTW "clickable paper" check @clickableprint Great minds:-)

Me:
Ricoh Rocks! Check out visual search post..vids and links. http://ilnk.me/16a1 The next step to @clickableprint

RicohInnovation RT @ToughLoveforX: Ricoh Rocks! Check out visual search post..vids and links. http://ilnk.me/16a1 The next step to @clickableprint

Moodstocks RT @ToughLoveforX: Spend 4:57 min with @RicohInnovation video on QR, Visual Search and Social Networking Mind blowing ! http://ilnk.me/16a3

Did you know that @Moodstocks "specializes in visual search on the Internet"

Me RT
Moodstocks RT @delunna: A must read! Visual Search, #AugmentedReality and a Social Commons for the Physical World Platform http://bit.ly/7pRP9r

The Money Tweet:
#QR ers MUST read for state of the art on where it's all going. AR and the "no click interface" http://ilnk.me/16aa Smart & Lots of links.

http://ilnk.me/16aa will take you to:
Visual Search, Augmented Reality and a Social Commons for the Physical World Platform: Interview with Anselm Hook

A response to Jim Lyons post on QR. It's about compliance, not marketing.

2010-01-25T17:36:00.002-05:00

I tried to post this at Jim's post, but it got complicated. As readers of this blog have probably figured out I don't like complicated.

The original post, most definitely worth the click is at Jim's blog. The post is January Observations -- From the QR Code sandbox — will It help printing?

My comment

Jim,
Thanks for the kind words. Just wanted to share a thought about
"the question remains whether this technology is good for printing."

I have commercial print experience and dna. But I have been following the conversation about MPS and MFP every since Greg Walters, Art Post and You got on my RSS and email notification.

Another under appreciated fact of QR is that it is possible to encode a Purl - a personalized url. This might turn out to be a big deal for MPS because it allows the capture of when a particular person either clicked on the code, or when to the human readable URL.

The issue is not advertising, it is compliance. Just one use case to give you an idea of what I mean:

A large organization is required by law to inform their employees of X. And they are required to be able to produce proof that the employee was appropriately notified.

By using a Personalized Url, changing into a human readable URL - through link shortening - and also embedding that Url inot a 2d Code, one could print out a notification at the MFP.

Then one can capture in a colud based data base whether that person went to the URL to read the document. Even more important, it will give management timely information about who didn't yet click on the document.

Once the manager has that info, she can send an email the next day, "Dear X, I asked you to look at the document yesterday. Please do so today."

My own interest is in high school education. The same process could be very useful in that context, especially in addressing the problem of students who get lost.

At any rate, if this process proves out, it's a very low cost - high value addition to any MPS contract. As the margin on boxes keeps getting slimmer and slimmer, I would think it would be an interesting proposition for Independent MPS.

What if an MFP were a news output device?

2010-01-25T07:36:00.002-05:00

In the States, a new form of journalism is emerging. As of today, it's gotten on my radar in Texas, California and Connecticut.

CT Mirror is nnother new business model for Journalism at the State level http://ilnk.me/166e It seems similar to @texastribune

California Watch: The latest entrant in the dot-org journalism boom http://ilnk.me/166f

There are different business models for each outfit. But each a web only. Web only is a niche market. Only print and TV are mass market medium.

Consider and A4 or A3 with human readable URL's and QR codes, that takes the headline and the lede from the XML on the newspaper site. Or takes a twitter stream with HR URLs and QR code.

Or if not an MFP, then a PDF as a newspaper insert or supplied to print with the run. Or if not a PDF, then a 24 page newspaper.

Then earn some revenue with ads from NGO's and Government Social Service.

Just when the smoke was clearing, a new player cames to the States. MGI and they speak Twitter!

2010-01-23T06:44:00.003-05:00

If all the globals could learn to speak twitter it would be so much easier for everyone to figure out how to get from here to there.

It started about 15 hours ago. I came across an interesting post at @mbossed.

I'm @ToughLoveforX . He is @MGI_USA .

I said:
Did you know that @socialprintexp is built on the MGI press. Convo going on now at @mbossed http://ilnk.me/1637 || Ain't Fridays grand?

@Socialprintexpo Any thoughts/ links? to why did 15 customers buy an MGI press over an #HP Indigo?" Digital Print 360 http://ilnk.me/ed0

Then I got an email notification that @MGI_USA was "following".

I said:
@MGI_USA Thanks for the follow and welcome to the States:-) Maybe you can explain why what's so cool about MGI? http://ilnk.me/ed0

He said:
@ToughLoveforX Sure! 1.Substrates (paper, plastics, ENVELOPES) 2. Up to 13 x 47" size 3. Laser-safe 4. No click charge 5. Outstanding color

I said:
@MGI_USA " 4. No click charge" 13 x 47 ? very, very cool. Got anything EZ on TCO? inkjet not toner? Needs conditioned air space?

He said:
@ToughLoveforX presses are dry toner, although an inkjet press for card apps is out late 2010 - std climate & hum. control, no chiller req.

@ToughLoveforX that's just our Meteor DP60 Pro digital press - we also have the JETvarnish digital inkjet spot UV coater + other finishing

I said:
@MGI_USA got a vid anywhere?

He said:
@ToughLoveforX check out our Web site for vids: http://tinyurl.com/yem49a2

I said:
@MGI_USA thanks for link I really like "MGI’s My PhotoBook Shop" http://ilnk.me/1639

Then I RT'ed.

The City of Cincinnati talks about their MGI Meteor DP60 Pro in the Nov issue of In-Plant Graphics: http://tinyurl.com/yh586bz

MGI USA adds 3 more dealers to US network: http://bit.ly/4iREF2

Custom Textbooks Created on HP Equipment

2010-01-21T08:17:00.001-05:00

By now it's no longer a new story. But here's another data point on the opportunity for versioned print in education. Soon someone will scale personalized (in addition to the versioned) Then someone will add QR or other 2d codes.

Then some high school admin somewhere is going to see the value of personalized print + QR to increase attendance and behavior compliance with a minimally invasive intervention.

Then we can all move on to even more interesting problems.

The full story is at Global Print Monitor

"Making the grade in educational publishing

As public schools across the US strive to improve education for all students, the needs of individual states, districts and schools become apparent. Mercury Print Productions found a way to address these needs by creating customised textbooks with the new HP Indigo W7200 Digital Press.

'Because of the No Child Left Behind Act, a school's funding is somewhat dependent on students' test scores,' explains Christian Schamberger, vice president of operations, Mercury Print Productions. 'The ability to customise textbooks to ensure students learn what they need to can help improve test scores and secure the school's funding.'"

Screen to launch Indigo rival at Ipex

2010-01-20T19:36:00.000-05:00

Just when I thought I had the players figured, here comes Screen with an inkjet to go against the Indigo. I keep looking for stories about the Screen Inkjet at AlphaGraphics printing American editions of the Daily Mail newspaper. None have gotten on my radar since the first stories many months.

If anyone has some info, please leave a comment.

Anyway's here's the snippet from Proprint. Details at the click:

ProPrint:
"Screen will use Ipex 2010 for the commercial launch of the Truepress JetSX – a B2 inkjet press that has already attracted 'a fair bit of interest' here in Australia."

It's time to Stop Evangelizing and Start Selling.

2010-01-20T07:13:00.003-05:00

From the inside it seems that the job is to "convince" and "educate" end users about the value of print and 2d codes. As usual, if you take a glance outside it seems that "convincing and education" are no longer needed.

This morning I found this one. I don't want to turn this into a long post, so I won't belabor the the point. If you're interested follow me at twitter @toughloveforx . In between my relentless pursuit of those who are going to fix high school dropouts, I tweet examples of QR and other 2d codes being used in the real world.

It's the beginning of a land grab. No "education" or "evangelizing" needed in a land grab.

Mobile provides instant interaction with consumers - Mobile Marketer - Advertising:
"Bar code branding
Text-message opt-ins are far from the only way to engage consumers. Another option? Mobile bar codes.

Scanbuy Inc. has launched a number of products for brands such as American Airlines, Volkswagen and Sprint with the use of bar codes.

“Mobile barcodes are an extremely easy and trackable way to mobilize any traditional media from print to packaging,” said Jonathan Bulkeley, CEO of Scanbuy, New York. “In our experience, the keys to getting results are to give the consumer something of value and communicate clearly with a strong call-to-action."

Who would have thought that a Cable Channel would go into the textbook business. And the opportunity for Print.

2010-01-18T19:13:00.002-05:00

About a half hour ago I found this in my twitter stream.

cmt1 DigitalContent vs textbooks http://bit.ly/7X2f8w

So then I said this:

Indianapolis Public Schools Replace Textbooks with Digital Content http://ilnk.me/1577 | Precisely the opprtnty for #Xerox+espresso & #MPS.

Looking a bit more, I got to this:

Did you know that Discovery Communications LLC. has replaced textbooks in Indianapolis http://ilnk.me/1577

and then this:

A cable channel replaces textbooks in Indianopolis http://ilnk.me/1578 Discovery Edu is a subsidiary of Discover Communications, LLC.

The point for print
If you ask any classroom teacher they will tell you that the idea of replacing print with online is a figment of some politician's imagination. Sounds good, but it will not scale at least for a long time

Discovery Communications LLC has taken their long tail of content, focused on making money from education, not donating to education.

Consider the long tail at PBS or NPR or Nat Geo or the Then consider the long tail at every serious newspaper in the States. Put that together with Xerox + Espresso or with any MFP that can seemlessly transfer XML to print streams.

Then think about what it would mean to add personalized QR and shortened URLs: Information exchange data from teaching with no teacher time needed.

I'll leave the rest to your imagination.

If I were HP, Oce, Ricoh, Riso and had to respond to Xerox + Espresso, what I would do ...

2010-01-18T13:01:00.004-05:00

It's going to be an interesting week. The conversation at Print Ceo is starting for real.

The vulnerability of the Espresso is that, as I understand it, it is PDF based. The network agreements that Jason Epstein has put together with publishers is a very defensible value. But the amount of content in PDF is dwarfed many times over by the content in XML.

Wikipedia is in XML. PediaPress in Germany has been selling Wikipedia in Print for many years. Obviously they have a done a deal with wikipedia to share some of the value. From what I can see, the books ordered by Pedia Press customers is for a very narrow market. And the production model is print and distribute. I believe that Oce is the output device.

But, the Xerox + Espresso turns that paradigm on it's head. Any book, any where, any time has gone from a vision to one more way that digital print can change the world.

At any rate, here's my two cents:
Partner with the best XML to digital print stream people you can find. Get the engineers to add some binding to the MFP. If it were me, I would do it faster, rather than slower.

Xerox + Espresso is not about the box. The value is the Network.

2010-01-18T07:49:00.003-05:00

This morning, I came across this:

@proprint Xerox to sell Espresso Book Machine: Xerox has signed an agreement to sell the Espresso Book Machine http://bit.ly/5Up04p

Replying to a comment to yesterday's post I said,

I agree that if the name of the game was selling boxes it's not a big deal. But the way I read the releases Xerox will be selling the Espresso, not merely supplying the boxes.

That's a much bigger deal.

The defensible value of the Espresso are the contracts that Jason Epstein has made with the publishers. Once those are in place, I agree that the machinery can be easily replicated by any other vendor.

With Xerox's purchase of ACS they have made it crystal clear that going forward the value is MPS. If Xerox is the channel for selling expresso how hard would it be to role in a special deal for including an Espresso as part of an MPS contract?

Consider if Xerox adds an Espresso to their offerings in education and government MPS. I would keep a look out to see if they get one of the school book publishers to come on board. If and I think when they do, it means customized textbooks delivered with no logistics and very little sales expense directly to the school building or district.

Ursula and her team realize that margins on boxes and toner are going to be very slim. But margins on MPS are defensible and supply a nice stream of recurring revenue.

In a tweet this am I said this:

in Queensland: stdnts are publishing their books as part of the govs project. http://ilnk.me/153b || With #Xerox+Espresso it would be EZ.

My bet is that the Espresso Deal will do for Xerox what the Docutech did back in the day.

2010-01-17T08:58:00.003-05:00

The conversation started on Friday with the announcement that Xerox will be selling the Espresso. On Friday Noel Ward did a story at GAM and Printweek.com reported in the UK. On Saturday, Cary Sherburne did a post at PrintCEO. All of the stories are well worth the read.

At any rate, here's my two cents at PrintCeo.

When I saw the announcement it recalled the feeling I had when I saw the first story about the Docutech in the Wall Street Journal.

It seems that this deal is the docutech reinvented for a networked society. The money sentence to me is “we believe fully distributed solutions will become an integral part of the supply chain.”

It’s the same idea of a mature “distribute and print” model the industry has been talking about for years. But until the web matured it was a vision instead of a strategy.

O’Reilly has said that the web is now moving into the real world. He calls it “Web squared.” QR codes are an on ramp from the print to the web. The Espresso/Xerox deal is one off ramp from the web to print.

One can only assume that once the Xerox engineers take a really close look at the output box, it will get more and more efficient. One can also safely assume that if Xerox sales gets involved it will get less and less expensive.

One interesting question going forward is how Xerox will integrate selling Espresso with their PSPs. The natural would be to sell through the MFP channel.

I’m hoping they are figuring out a method to use their Premier Partners to add the Espresso offering to increase the PP value to their clients.

Espresso Deal for BIg X may be Docutech 2010

2010-01-15T07:57:00.002-05:00

When I first heard about the Xerox and Espresso deal yesterday, I looked at through the lens of selling boxes. But today, I saw the article at PrintWeek with the much bigger story : Xerox to sell Espresso Book Machine | printweek.com "

I think it's a natural for every college book store in the States to have one or two Espresso Book Machines. Just needs a deal between XRX and BN.

Moving forward why not every CRD in every school district?

I still remember the feeling I got when I read about the Docutech in the Wall Street Journal. It gave me the chills when it was described as a book machine. I have to say I had the same feeling yesterday.

Xerox to sell Espresso Book Machine | printweek.com "
Xerox has signed an agreement to sell the Espresso Book Machine (EBM), the revolutionary on-demand book printer, alongside its Xerox 4112 printer.

The worldwide distribution agreement heralds a major step forward for EBM manufacturer On Demand Books, which released the first version of the machine in 2006."

Xerox Rocks! And it's not about ACS.

2010-01-14T13:01:00.001-05:00

So between this and that I checked in at Twitter and found this:

@APKO
Xerox and On Demand Books will jointly market and sell, on a worldwide basis, the Xerox 4112(tm) Copier/Printer... http://bit.ly/6B6r7a

So then I Googled Xerox and On Dmeand books and got to this:

Xerox Technology to Fuel Espresso Book Machine; Worldwide Agreement Includes Global Marketing and Sales Support:

"ROCHESTER, N.Y.--(BUSINESS WIRE)

- Xerox Corporation's (NYSE: XRX) digital technology will bring speed and exceptional image quality to books produced on demand by the patented Espresso Book Machine(R). This cutting-edge book solution, sold by On Demand Books, LLC, produces millions of copyrighted, public domain, out-of-print, or rare texts for consumers in a matter of minutes."

There's a pretty good chance that On Demand books will finally bring to life the book machine at the point of the buyer. That means inventory problems go away for small bookstores. It could also mean books printed at the CRD for school districts.

It's still a little tricky to figure out what it means for Big X's PSPs. If it were me, I would do a sweet deal so they could offer instant books for their customers. But however it plays out, this could be a banner day for big X.

Enuff already with "Market Service Provider." Think like Benjamin Franlin.

2010-01-11T06:26:00.003-05:00

Jeff Jarvis said " Do what you do best, and leave the rest."

Bartash Inc. are not "market service providers." They are imaginative business oriented Printers, just like Ben Franklin.

Press Release at WhatTheyThink.

Sidney Simon, owner and CEO of Bartash Inc., Philadelphia’s largest coldset web printer, " When we studied the list of approximately 300 publications that we print, we immediately saw patterns that are ideal for national advertisers. Singly, many of these regional and niche publications don’t have the circulation numbers to entice the largest insert advertisers, but through the Bartash ROI™ program, advertisers can achieve the response they want.”

Enuff already with "Print is Dead" and "XYZ" is the next big thing. Just follow the money.

2010-01-10T08:31:00.005-05:00

I have a feeling that 2010 will finally be the time to retire a couple of buzzwords that obscure what's going on. My first nomination is "Print is Dead." My second is "Market Service Provider".

As I've said since January 2009, when I first started blogging, Printers print. To survive and thrive it means printing better, faster and cheaper than the other guy. And it means inventing new uses for Print, not trying to make believe we're something we're not.

Rather than a long blah blah, I thought it might be useful to share some numbers.

Consolidated Graphics (CGX) is up 92.47% since 8/20 and McClatchey (MNI) is up 773.28% since 4/15 . Check out some of the other stocks in my IRA printernet portfolio to see what I'm seeing.

Welcome to 2010. "two HP Indigo 7000 replace less-efficient analog offset systems

2010-01-08T05:38:00.004-05:00

This came over the transom this morning.

PALO ALTO, Calif., Jan. 7, 2010 – HP today announced that Capitol City Press, Tumwater, Wash., has installed two HP Indigo 7000 digital presses with HP SmartStream workflow solutions, replacing less-efficient analog offset systems.

It shouldn't be a surprise that it happened just outside of Seattle. The future often happens first in the American Northwest. What caught my attention is

The new HP Indigo 7000s now print the 750,000 four-color sheets per month that Capitol City previously ran on three older, small offset presses.

For Capitol City it sounds like the decision was based on better, faster, cheaper to meet their present customer's needs. This was not about "reinventing themselves" to become "market service providers."

It was about doing what they already know how to do. Just doing it better and more efficiently.

Holistic Quantum Reality? I must be kidding Actually, I'm not.

2010-01-07T11:07:00.004-05:00

The point is to have humility in the face of complexity. What name you give it is up to you.

Since the outlines for the next stage of print are now pretty clear (Mobile computing takes the web into the real world. Print lives in the real world. As Print connects to the web, it's all good.) And since the market is calming done (McClatchey went from around .80 to over 4.00 last time I looked.)

It leaves a little space to get into really interesting questions. The following is a copy and paste from http://ilnk.me/HQR1

In my humble opinion, it's exactly on the right track. Yes, it may sounds nuts to "serious people who have to make a living and have important meetings to go to."

But have you ever had a chance to do a little read of Quantum Theory? If you want nuts, that's nuts. Only thing is that it's true.

Copy and Paste follows:

What is Holistic Quantum Relativity?

Since many have asked for a simple explanation of HQR, this is an
attempt at providing it, with heartfelt apologies for all errors and
omissions.

The Absolute is indefinable, nameless, formless, wordless, soundless,
although when it comes into expression it is known by different Names!

Let us take a table. What is it essentially made of? Wood on the
surface and underlying that... what? Energy! Why? Let us examine the
wood under a powerful electron microscope. What is it made of? Carbon
and hydrogen atoms amongst other types connected to each other with
what? Energy bonds and vast open spaces... What are the carbon atoms
made of? A nucleus and polarised charge clouds with electrons etc
and... what? Energy packets and vast open spaces... What is the
nucleus made of? Sub-atomic particles and... what? Quantised energy
and vast open spaces!

Beyond the 1920s we referred to the nucleus as a collection of protons
and neutrons enveloped by an electron charge cloud and step by step we
have put so many designer labels on the sub-parts -- sub-nuclear
particles -- that at last count there were at least 100+ different
names for such energy particles and growing!

Now, as we go deeper... and observe: the sub-atomic particles -- all
flavours -- are just forms of packet (Quantum) energy connected with
each other as Happenings, ie, "Haps" manifest as pulsating particles
or waves depending on how we look at them or don't! [Heisenberg ist
wunderbar!]

The "Haps" are the sequence in which the entire universe connects to
create a grand holographic story, yes, the illusion of duality, which
when looked at holistically is all just One space-time continuum of
energy, which can be expressed as a grand manifestation of light or
cosmic vibration simultaneously appearing and disappearing as matter,
based on the illusory lens of observation set at simultaneous multiple
planes of consciousness! No wonder, at first glance, it makes no
sense. It confuses, disturbs and we end up being doubtful! No need to
be doubtful of inherent volatilities or ripples in the pond, which is
just a metaphor for the "Grand Narrative"!

What is HQR suggesting in a nutshell?

We ignore micro- and macro- layers, connections and connectivity at
our peril because this is the interwoven fabric of the entire
universe! As we evolve, the more we are able to connect with our
within. Beyond people, events, places, stories, facts, fiction,
things etc we re-create nascent haps in our mind-spirit matrix as
suliminal and then neural networks. Step by step, everything appears
connected within a "Grand Narrative." All becomes Holistic when we
align the without with our within. The past, present and future merge
into one when the immanent spirit triumphs over logic and the creative
spark overtakes the mundane banality of our tedium-inspired illusory
entrapment!

Holos is not just "Whole", it is essentially about recognising
perfection: Why? The so called good, bad and ugly do not exist but
only do so in the duality of our mind's perception. Holistically, all
is there for a perfectly valid reason or completely not there for a
perfectly valid reason manifest as Synchronicity! Perfectly timed,
perfectly placed, perfectly connected!

If we were to revisit the original 30+ HQR Socratic dialogues what we
would find is that even these humble thoughts have been expressed
within them. Everything is connected with everything else and that is
the "Grand Narrative" of our existence. Once we are able to recognise
the Quantum nature of Energy, the Relativity of our existence
suspended in an illusory -- disconnected -- duality of the mind (an
entrapment) and that our true essence, the spirit, is Holistic and no
different from the Cosmic Origin of the entire universe and beyond --
The Supra Universal Consciousness -- we are then able to recognise
that Holistic Quantum Relativity = Spirit Mind Connectivity.

Within the dynamic HQR of our trinitised existence: The Father is the
Supra Universal Consiousness (Divine and Primordial Awareness at all
Eight planes); The Son is the Universal Consciousness (Director of
Mental Awareness at Three lower planes); and The Spirit is the
Consciousness (Individual Spirit or Soul's Awareness entrapped at a
restricted number of lower planes) made Holy via the "Word" or
"Vibration".

The teachings of Sant Mat "Way of the Saints" suggest that creation
occurs through primordial "Vibration", a vibratory principle, known in
various languages as "Naam", "Shabda", "Kalma", "Logos", and "Word",
and that individual salvation and enlightenment is achieved when the
human soul is put into contact with it through the agency of a Great
Spiritual Master who has that principle fully manifest within ("Word
made flesh"). Sant Mat masters state the Holy Spirit also mentioned in
several Holy books, refers to this principle, citing many passages
referring to "baptism in the Holy Spirit", revelations received while
"in the Spirit", and Great Spiritual Masters and Philosopher
Scientists -- Socrates, Pythagoras, Buddha, Lao Tse Tsu, Jesus,
Maulana Rumi, Kabir and Kirpal et al -- curing with the Spirit as
indications that they were conferring initiation into the esoteric
practice of the "Word" - Surat Shabda Yoga - Soul Vibration Union
during their lifetimes.

The moment the Spirit recognises that it is none other than a part of
the Supra Universal Consciousness and acts as such, the duality
imposed by the mental faculties is removed step by step. There is a
rich narrative of connectivity going all the way back to creation put
together Holistically with perfection, Quantised by Time and Energy,
and then re-presented as Relativity as a Space-Time Continnum
connected across multiple planes, which we cannot externally visualise
as ONE, but only in our within and then alone via our "Rising
Consciousness" that:

"Yes! We are indeed all One-in-All and All-in-One!"

Maybe HP or Oce/Canon will reinvent education

2009-12-27T11:41:00.002-05:00

While wandering on a path that started in the twitter stream, I came upon, HelloBrand. The path was a little complicated, but in any case I got the page that lead to the following tweet.

#HP Snapfish as augmented by @Hello_World http://ilnk.me/117d is almost precisely what is needed to reinvent textbooks in USA.

Turns out that HelloBrand worked on the Snapfish update that allows a user to get a printed version of their photographs. I assume but don't know that Kodak has a similar functionality. The point is that it's become pretty clear by now that the new opportunity for Print is to publish XML into the real world for wider effect.

Given the massive fleet of Indigos around the world and HP's recent launch of a website that makes it easy for anyone in the world to find the HP PSP most convenient, it seems that all the pieces are in place.

On the other hand, Oce has a significant fleet of digital newspaper output PSPs around the world. With the emergence of Niiu in Berlin, the pathway seems clear. As I understand it Niiu version 1.0 is optimized for PDF. My bet is that Version 2.0 or 3.0 will be optimized for XML.

As that develops, it means that even more web content will be organized by XML. That's where the knowledge management folks come in. My twitter friend in the Netherlands is @weknowmore.

So then I tweeted:

By way of introduction @niiu_community meet @Weknowmore meet @Hello_World. You're all in NorthWest Euroland.

Why did Canon buy Oce? Because of Ingram.

2009-12-20T09:27:00.002-05:00

My understanding is that Oce machinery powers digital book production for Ingram. I think I read a while ago that Ingram bought about 20 machines to set up in London. (should be confirmed).

In any case, the CEO of Ingrams is not distracted by PrintIsDead blah blah.

From Tennessean.com
Skip Prichard, president and CEO of Ingram Content Group in La Vergne, heads up an array of companies for the Ingram family that have been on the front lines of book manufacturing, distribution, sales and marketing in a fast-changing new media landscape.

With a background in digital content and a law degree, Prichard now finds himself, after 2½ years at Ingram, presiding over a restructured company with an international sales reach.

It's a long article. If you're still not convinced, you can find it here

If you won't listen to me about textbooks, maybe you'll listen to a teacher

2009-12-19T17:00:00.003-05:00

The following is reposted from a comment to the previous post.

The viewpoint is that of @chadsansing Chad teaches humanities at a charter school and blogs about reforming classroom practice. NBCT, NETS*T

Are any K12 text book publishers going hyperlocal for customized, print-on-demand reading comprehension collections or workbooks for kids?

Another way to leverage the works they've licensed might be to sub-license school districts permissions to remix text books with student input for reading content differentiated to students' levels and interests.

A company could charge the same price as a workbook, but let the school division pay the paper price, using the larger profit margin to pay for the infrastructure to deliver the texts and remix interface to divisions. And why not throw some QR tags on each page back to additional online resources or practice hosted by the company?

I'd rather not send text book companies any more money.

School budgets are drying up, and there's an awful lot that can be done with free software and open-access informational texts. I hope open-source education beats companies to the differentiated-textbook-on-demand punch.

Until there's a compelling collection packaged for easy use, divisions and teachers will probably stick with what they're given. Any chance of open source education drafting authors to produce CC or public domain work for schools? Is this going on already?

Print is D-E-A-D. A twitter conversation.

2009-12-19T08:39:00.005-05:00

He is @JeffMello , Founder of Evolution of Communication a social engagement, digital marketing, mobile, and emerging technology consulting company.

Me is @ToughLoveforX , retired.

It began yesterday,
Me: Assertion: #SM is merely a transitional technology. It will get old, fast. The only two mass mediums in the real world are Print and TV.

Then continued this morning,
He: Describe QR please.

Me: QR is a printed ( or displayed on screen ) graphic that can send and receive info from the web with one click on a smart phone.

You can get a good idea of the issues involved at 2D Codes in the Global Media at LinkedIn http://ilnk.me/100c

He: QR sounds good but old world print with ink...not so much:)

Me: There we go again about "old." I prefer enduring. In 500 years Print has seen it all. And changed as needed to thrive.

as for "old world" China is the one of the oldest in the world. Maybe old is the new "new"? and Print is the next big thing.

He: Print is dead my friend! D-E-A-D!

Me: D-E-A-D? Then howto explain that CGX and Donnelly stock is up over 50% While McClatchy is up almost 7X and Gannett 5X.

He: For Gannett I would say without the research that they have rolled all their media into 1 stock.

Me: I have my little IRA in all print related companies. So far up 85% this year. Print is far from D-E-A-D. Just ignored.

He: Don't think of the medium but content. Newspapers were not successful because they are paper but the journalist's content.

Me: "Don't think of the medium but content" Actually the medium really is the message. McCluhan had it just right.

Re Newspapers:The enduring value of newspapers has never been news, it's always been the paper. Consider @niiu_community .

He: If u define print as also digital then no...it is not dead.

Me: I knew we could agree! Digital printing is Print's adaptive response in the evolution of the communication ecology. :-)

He: Nice use of my company name! U know how to win me over every time:)

Me: U have to keep in mind that I sold Print for 35 years. Back in the day some called me "the prince of bullshit." thx 4 convo :-)

He: LOL! LOve it and look forward to more discussions.

Manroland GB is soooo smart. New environment. New Business model

2009-12-17T09:53:00.000-05:00

from Printweek:

Manroland GB no longer reliant on press sales | printweek.com |

"Press manufacturer Manroland GB has said it has replaced its dependency on press sales with a business model that can break even on services and parts.

Managing director Norman Revill said: 'We started to feel things tightening in July 2007. Budgets were being held and printers were only buying what they really needed. From 2007 to 2009, we have completely changed our business model and strategy.

'We have separated our Print Services, Printcom and spare parts business from our sales side and we are able to break even on those three alone. We are set up to break even without sales, so we are sustainable through tough periods.'"

Free Advice to Xerox: Get in front of the toner shortage thing. Today would be good.

2009-12-16T06:00:00.004-05:00

I apologize to the folks at Printweek.com. for the copy and paste below. I could have done snippets, but the article is just too tightly written. I highly recommend Printweek.com to anyone interested in staying abreast of what's going on in not-the United States.

Meanwhile I mostly love everything I see that come out of Xerox UK, but clearly some system broke down someplace. Too much unneccesary brand damage that comes from stuff like:

According to director Neil Winstanley, there has been little useful contact from the manufacturer and it took a week of phone calls to establish that the order "should be completed next week".

Printers speak out over Xerox toner shortage
Adam Hooker, printweek.com, 11 December 2009
Printers have said they will seek reimbursement from Xerox after a toner shortage forced a number of companies to cease production.

Digital press manufacturer Xerox said the toner shortage was due to high levels of demand. Toner for the Xerox 700 press is understood to be the most affected and some customers are having to wait up to ten days for deliveries.

The scale of the problem is currently unclear. However, all six Xerox 700 users that PrintWeek spoke to had experienced some disruption to supply of Xerox's wax-based toner, with many having lost income as a result.
Xerox declined to comment on the scale of problem, but said that it was "doing its best" to address any customer concerns.
"We want to make sure we help as much as we can and we are working very, very hard. If customers want to contact with any concerns we will do our best to answer any questions," a spokesman said.
However, printers faced with lost earnings have told PrintWeek that they will be pursuing Xerox for compensation.
Martin Whetton, managing director at Pro DM Solutions in Ripley, said that his company placed an order on 24 November and received two toners on 9 December, when it required 10 to complete a large monthly job.
He estimated that the problem has lost his company around £5,000 worth of work.
He said: "I would consider going after Xerox to cover our losses. I would hope that Xerox would offer compensation without the need for legal action."

Eslewhere, Digital Studio in St Albans launched a new calendar and gift website specifically timed to coincide with Christmas.
Paul Warren, director, said: "We spent £14,000 on this website. If we don't get any toner in we will be doing a lot of refunding. I have pulled adverts off of Google because I don't want to be known as the Moonpig wannabe that couldn't deliver.
"We pay £10,000 a quarter for service, so in a sense we have paid for the toner, it's part of the package. We will be going to Xerox and we hope to prove the orders we have received and then lost as a result, as we stand to lose about £20,000 because of this."
Minuteman in Bristol has also experienced problems with toner deliveries in the past. In October this year, it had to taxi toner from other printers to keep its 700 running.
Managing director Peter Wise said: "We ended up paying for taxis to pick up toner from other printers and charging Xerox. They paid after we provided them with all receipts. We will do that again if we have to."
However, not everyone is chasing reimbursement. Litha Print in Stockport received one set of cartridges on 10 December, having ordered four on 26 November. By that point its machine had "laid idle for five days".
According to director Neil Winstanley, there has been little useful contact from the manufacturer and it took a week of phone calls to establish that the order "should be completed next week".
He said: "I've heard some are considering going after Xerox for lost earnings, but right now all I want is my toner order."
Cheshire printer DXG Media put an order in on 2 December, which is yet to arrive. Managing director Duarte Goncalves explained that the company enough to keep going for the time being, but would begin to worry if nothing has arrived by early next week.
However, for Goncalves, misinformation as much as anything has been the issue here.
He said: "We were told three days was the limit and if we ordered by 2pm we could get it next day. That has never happened."
Xerox would not comment on specific details of the problem or how it was prioritising its deliveries, but Jim Brasser, vice president of Global Consumables Supply Chain at Xerox, said: "We are very much aware of the current, short-term situation concerning the supply of toner cartridges, resulting from growth in demand in certain situations.
"This is not a general shortage and only affects certain products. Our supplies inventory is being replenished daily and shipped to customers immediately. The vast majority of orders are being fulfilled within about a week, and we expect that pace to quicken. We are working closely with our customers to address their needs as quickly as possible."

Exactly Correct from Andy McCourt . Why does so much good sutff come from Australia?

2009-12-15T07:40:00.004-05:00

What could I possibly add to a print person who quotes Ovid. So I won't.

Copy & paste from Print21Online.com

Top tips to triumph in 2010 – Andy McCourt
It’s customary to look back at the year in flight for the final 2009 issue of Print21, but being the ardent rule-breaker that I am, I’d like to offer readers my ideas for ten pointers to success in 2010.

After all, why write about a truly rotten year when we can all look forward to a much livelier New Year? We can’t undo what has happened but we can learn from it and, to all those printing businesses that have survived and even prospered during the financial meltdown, a big pat on the back!

1) Attack yourself. Sounds crazy but many large corporations use this tactic. Attacking your own weak spots is actually the best defensive strategy there is. It’s not a form of masochism – properly executed it is an organisational improver. Example: you are a mid-sized printer and those pesky print management companies keep sniping accounts away. Tactic: set up a print management company and use your own print operation as just one of many possible suppliers, having to compete along with the rest, no favours. Another example, if you are a high-quality printer fed up with delivering premium product at a knock-down price, set up in opposition to yourself with an ‘El Cheapo Print’ type of concern. It will be profitable, and will improve margins on your premium offering.

2) Get a business coach. No man is an island, we all need to rub shoulders with peers and exchange ideas. But business coaching and/or mentoring goes several steps further. It’s not just for struggling businesses, far from it, fast growing highly successful businesses use professional business coaches to mange the growth and deliver on KPIs. A business coach is your ‘Jimminy Cricket’ or that inner voice that says “don’t do it this way, consider another plan.” Objectivity is paramount and so many printers are nose-to-the-grindstone types who can only see subjective issues. Hire a competent business coach. Google it; I’m not going to do all the work for you!

3) Zig when others are zagging. Bandwagons can be profitable for short spells but you soon fall off. If everyone else is in on ‘the next big thing’ – find something different. Classic Greek sage Ovid wrote: “In the pool where you least expect it, there you will find a fish.” What else can you produce on your existing equipment? Niche markets can be beautiful places until the ravaging hoards de-niche them. Create new niches constantly. And make hay while the Sun shines on them, which it will.

4) Down-sell. “Now he has gone bonkers,” I hear you say. All the sales logic in the world points to up-selling where possible. I’d like to say that in 2010, this should not apply to the printing industry. Get out of the habit of offering longer print runs for diminishing margin return. It just makes you work longer for less. If Mr/s Customer says “okay I need 5,000”, why not say “why don’t we print 1,000 and you can asses the response, we can make any changes, and then print another 1,000 next week.” Naturally, for very short runs that means digital. The customer sees you are saving him money and you are also avoiding redundancy, so saving waste into the bargain. It also puts you in contact with the customer more regularly, which is a good thing and keeps the oppo at bay.

5) Tell fibs about digital. Like it or not, hardly anyone gives a toss about “offset quality” anymore. The ‘in’ word is digital; it is in synch with the zeitgeist of the second decade of the 21st century. So promote your business as ‘Digital, Green and Proud of it.’ You’ll need a digital machine of course but when jobs come in that are screamingly, obviously, common-sensically better placed on an offset press – just do it. And don’t volunteer the fact to the customer. Let them complement the high quality of your digital print. Offset with CTP is really a digital process anyway and if you have a Presstek or other DI press even more so. It’s not really a big fib; just using the secrets of the back-room to provide better customer service and maybe make a bit more margin. If it really bothers you, just say three ‘Hail Caxtons’ and consider yourself absolved of all sin.

6) Advertise more. I don’t mean Yellow Pages. Use your own processes to create dynamic DM to your local business market. Try not to mention “printing.” How about: “We can show you how to attract 50 per cent more customers than you are currently doing.” Something like that. Fish where the fish are.

7) Wrap your truck/s. Your delivery van or truck is a mobile billboard. If you haven’t already vehicle-wrapped it with snappy graphics, get cracking and experience the cheapest advertising you’ll ever find! Leave the grubby white Toyota Hiaces for the contract courier drivers.

8) Adopt a charity. Charity support is not only good corporate citizenship, but also a great networking method. It puts you in contact with other businesses and individuals and makes you look positively engaged with society.

9) Go to Ipex. Ipex 2010 is on at the National Exhibition Center, Birmingham, UK in May. There will not be a better opportunity to stimulate your brain and see the full glory of print communications until drupa 2012. And they speak English. Well, of sorts. www.ipex.org

10) Be a print champion. We’ve all had enough of the “print kills trees” bollocks. As the APIA www.australasianpaper.org urges, tell your friends at the BBQ, we are one of the most sustainable industries around and those that criticise us most are the biggest polluters – there are plenty of facts to back this up. Be a printer and be proud of it, proudly read newspapers and magazines and if someone persists with the ‘print bad’ fallacy, take them off your Christmas card list and send them a text message or tweet instead.

Wishing you and yours a very safe and happy Christmas and prosperous New Year!

Score another for Xerox (CA) EPS deal with UBC

2009-12-14T14:08:00.000-05:00

UBC-Xerox partnership targets costs, sustainability � UBC Public Affairs:

"UBC-Xerox partnership targets costs, sustainability

The University of British Columbia has entered a partnership with Xerox for new and cost-effective document and print management services.

The partnership agreement with Xerox Global Services (XGS) will enable easier, better and less expensive printing and copying of documents, according to Pierre Ouillet, UBC Vice President, Finance, Resources and Operations.

“The agreement will involve virtually all aspects of the document lifecycle, including printing, copying, scanning, faxing, design and delivery of print materials,

WOW. Here comes the HP printernet.HP Launches Printing Network

2009-12-14T12:48:00.002-05:00

This deserves a much longer post, but I don't have the time just this minute. More later. But, any one who has followed this blog knows what a printernet is. To see what I mean do a Google search on "Printernet"

It could have been Xerox Premier Partners or Oce's Digital Newspaper Network or Staples. But it's HP.

I'm still hoping they give me a way to get in on the action by figuring out a way to separate the print piece from the computer piece. My bet is that sooner or later.... but not as of today.

The money sentence:

The launch of the PSP Network is an exciting first step that brings a new dimension of versatility and reliability to print buying,” says Martin.

HP Launches Printing Network

"n an effort to drive printing business to its customers, HP announced the launch of the PSP Network, a global on-line directory for print buyers to find local print service providers—what it calls 'PSP'—around the world. The site lists more than 80 countries, from Latvia and Lithuania to Turkmenistan and Tunisia, as well as major print centers in the U.S. and Canada"

Google will change the world of Print: Living Stories and the Google Phone and the elimination of print drivers.

2009-12-13T15:14:00.004-05:00

What's next in 2010?
It's for a longer post, but what I see is a land grab in the world of QR and other 2d codes. I also believe that "distribute and print" will get much closer to a tipping point to various printernets. .

Most important is that Managed Print Services will integrate with the commercial print world to enable trackable Print in any form, at any time in any place with a minimum carbon footprint.

It's probably going to turn out to be a big deal.

Why I'm seeing what I think I'm seeing.
The world of print has been changing since Apple introduced the Mac and more importantly with Adobe launched PDF. It's been a hard decade for us printers. Contrary to popular wisdom we are probably the most adaptive manufacturing industry on the planet.

My own hypothesis is that the resiliency of our industry comes from the fact that is organized in thousands of small shops. Each is required to innovate and change to stay alive in our local niches. What works quickly spreads. What doesn't work means businesses die. Since they are small the industry overall keeps changing.

At any rate, every twenty years or so something happens outside the world of Print that crystallizes a change and creates a "tipping point." My understanding is that the newspaper strike in the 60's created that "tipping point" for cold type versus hot type. And when the newspaper barons saw the business potential of steam driven printing, the mass newspaper was born.

Consider the Google reality by Q1, 2010.
If Living Story is still not on your radar, Google search on Living Story and take a look. This morning it was confirmed that Google is launching a Google branded unlocked smart phone in January, 2010. They have already distributed thousands of them to their own people.

The disruptive business innovation is that the phone is unlocked which means it will work with any carrier. That means that the "I want to get an iPhone but I hate AT&T " problem disappears. It also means a huge shift of power away from the telco's into the hands of the cvonsumer. Since everyone from Apple to Nokia to the other telco giants are going to have to respond, it plausibly means much greater and faster growth of the smart phone market. What might be described as a "tipping point."

Meanwhile this was posted this week:

Google: Chrome OS will revolutionize how printer drivers are handled, but not in 2010
But printers? As everyone knows, printers have highly specific, unique and complicated drivers associated with them. It’s why an operating system, stripped of its driver support, weighs in at a mere fraction of its initial gigabyte weight. Google is going to have to contend with drivers when they deal with Chrome.

How are they going to do that? Google’s not saying. “”We want to get out of the business of printer drivers. All the problems related to drivers we want to go away,” Upson said. But they say they have a new, “wonderful printing solution” up their sleeves to get rid of printer drivers once and for all. But that’s long-tail. “If [printer support] is important to you, Chrome OS is not the OS for you in 2010.”

Google + New York Times + Washington Post could be the final straw for textbooks and a huge new market for newspapers.

2009-12-11T14:06:00.005-05:00

It's been a very interesting week on twitter. The big news (2me) was finding the Google/New York Times/Washington Post Collaboration called Living Stories. If you haven't yet seen it, here's the link to the ongoing story on The Politics of Global Warming

The collaboration is to test out a new software tool that will be offered for free to newspapers. I have no idea if it's going to work, but my bet is that it will. If it does, it means that the newspaper industry will move to giving context. Context is valuable and is exactly what is needed for serious readers.

The under appreciated reality is that "real readers" is a niche market. As literacy continues to grow both in the States and globally no doubt that market will increase. But for now the opportunity to monetize is the same as it has always been - by delivering content in Print for mass distribution.

I've always believed the low hanging fruit is in education. It is the only mass market where people are trained and expected to be "real readers.'

Some of today's tweets:
Cnsdr: Living Stories ( http://ilnk.me/e1d ) + @niiu_community 1to1 24 pg #newspapers delvrd overnight ( http:ilnk.me/47e ) + QR codes.

Cnsdr:Living Stories( http://ilnk.me/e1d ) + @niiu_community ( http://ilnk.me/47e ) + QR codes = 2010 K-12 textbooks ( http://ilnk.me/e67 )

The printing audience for this blog probably know the story of Oce enabled personalized newspapers that launched in Berlin. Most of us also are pretty aware these days of the potential power and opportunity of 2d codes.

To say some you some time, I've reproduced the last link about versioned newspapers to replace textbooks below. It was orginally posted June, 2009.

http://ilnk.me/e67

My California
My California 21 is a unique history curriculum developed specifically to meet the needs of upper elementary and middle school students.
Newspaper format: 32 chronological issues resembling small newspapers present the story of California in a student-friendly, informal style that does not intimidate or repel young readers.

Some Global or PSP or MPS should really get in touch with these people. The next natural step will be The Clickable Newspaper.

Here's why:
On Wednesday, June 10, 2009, California will be phasing out textbooks for K -12 education. Instead, the so-called Digital Textbook Initiative will supposedly replace these old books with digital e-readers. Recognizing that one size fits all textbooks books were no longer the best tool to reach modern, tech-saavy students, Schwarzenegger said:

Kids, as you all know, today are very familiar with listening to their music digitally and online and to watch TV online, to watch movies online, to be on Twitter and participate in that and on Facebook. So basically kids are feeling so comfortable today, as a
matter of fact, as comfortable with their cell phones and with their keyboards as I did when I was your age, when I was a kid, with my pencils and crayons.

So this is why I think it is so important that we move on from the textbooks. The textbooks are outdated, as far as I'm concerned and there's no reason why our schools should have our students lug around these antiquated and heavy and expensive textbooks. California is the home of Silicon Valley. We are the world leader in technology and innovation, so we can do better than that.

Schwarzenegger's announcement should not be a surprise, since every state needs to save every penny it can. And it's also clear that the Obama Administration is serious about fixing education in the United States.

But what may go unnoticed is the new opportunity that this creates for newspapers struggling to find their niche in the new digital economy.

The Education Problem
A thanks to Alan Sitomer at the English Companion Ning for the point to YouTube.

The underlying problem with our public education is that it was never designed to create learning environments. It was originally grew out of the need to train a rural population to the new requirements of an industrial economy. It is no accident that most schools are organized into discrete classes that start and stop with the bell, since showing up on time, following directions, and performing well on specific tasks are the fundamental requirements of an mass market value chain industrial economy.

The other original function of our school systems was to filter and sort. The "smart kids" were filtered toward college and careers in management and the professions. The "less smart" were filtered to move first into the ever expanding manufacturing jobs supplied by ever expanding manufacturing and later into office-based service jobs. The "unruly" were consigned to doing whatever they had to do to survive.

Now that the underlying economy has changed from mass market to masses of niche markets and the real value of the workforce is its ability to respond creatively to ever changing challenges and opportunities, this old model has become obsolete. Around the country, there are the pockets of new models emerging -- and soon they will merge to create a tipping point.

The Newspaper Opportunity
Any teacher can tell you that a student really learns when the teachable moment occurs. The problem is that seeing and then taking advantage of that "teachable moment" is very difficult. A teacher must first be able to sense when it is going to happen, but even then it's almost impossible today to take advantage of that moment. The problem with textbooks is that they say do this, then do that. There is no way to leverage the teachable moments that happen in daily life -- for example, when GM crashes or the President makes a speech in Cairo -- to fit into a school curriculum.

Each of us have, at one time or another, followed a link to another link to another link. In that process, we were able to find just the appropriate story and data for us, at that time. What is interesting to me now may not be interesting to me an hour from now. That's the power of the web.

The problem for a teacher is that, for their students to learn what they need to learn, that journey needs an active mentor. Software designed interfaces are okay, but much less effective than a human who can both sense and quickly respond to needs that are felt but not yet articulated.

While undirected searching can very effective in the hands of person who already has a context in their brains, it is too unpredictable to be the primary method of educating a student who has yet to develop that same context that we take for granted. Given that different students have different learning styles, a complete reliance on computers is the same "one size fits all" approach that created the problem in the first place.

California Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger instead seems to moving in the direction of e-readers and web access. That is a good thing. But the reality is that the web as a medium has the advantage of speed and the very serious disadvantage of making it inconvenient to do "compare and contrast." The additional problem is that e-readers are going to have be managed and will break and students will lose them.

From the educational point of view, the fact is that print is the most convenient medium for compare and contrast. The essence of logical thinking is to compare and contrast before coming to a personal judgment. The more a student practices that activity, the more robust the logical thinking function in their brain.

It's not that hard to implement
The world of newspapers is designed for speed and relevance. Producing a print product on deadline is a natural and necessary skill for any newspaper organization. The skill sets are already well defined and in place. If the editorial decisions were made on the basis of educational standards instead of the "breaking news,"

Journalists are experts at crafting just the right words, pictures and videos to communicate stories. Teachers and textbook editors and writers are not. To be clear, it's not because they don't have the talent. It's because they don't have the practice.

Teachers are experts at knowing their students. They understand just the right words and actions to allow a student to learn. As they practice their mentoring skills, instead of their class management skills, they will become increasingly more proficient at it.

In a world where newspapers take up the mantle for education, the optimal teacher/newspaper experience might be something like this:

1) The teacher goes to a website that catalogs a library of newspaper stories based on the curriculum of each grade. They could be stored in a wiki and new stories added as they were requested by a teacher.

2) The teacher selects just the right series of stories for her class for the next week. Different classes could use learn from stories coming from different sections of the paper. Science classes would learn from stories from the science and technology beat, while English classes could benefit from great feature stories on items of community interest.

If it's good for the parents, it will be good for the kids. Maybe parents and kids could actually talk about the same thing after dinner or driving to the supermarket. The benefits to a math class might be less intuitive, but consider how much math high school kids could learn by reading business stories. Plus the stats from either baseball or wall street are completely compelling to many kids, opening up a whole slew of teachable moments.

3) The newspaper publisher delivers 200, 500, or 1000 copies of a 24 page newspaper to the school for next week's unit. This was not practical before the invention of digitally printed newspapers. But it is cost effective today.

The Business Model or Where's the Money?
The same place the money always came from -- advertising. But for delivery into the schools, the advertising is strictly limited to organizations involved in public health, safety and citizenship. Government organizations and foundations spend significant amounts of money both getting their message out and fund raising. It is a ready market that wants to change the behavior of exactly this audience.

Once California has eliminated textbooks from K -12, there is little doubt that the textbook business as it has developed over the last 40 years is done. The vacuum created could be just what a newspaper needs to get to the next stage of its development.

If Google, the New York Times and the Washington Post can play nicely together, what might that mean for Oce/Canon, Screen and HP

2009-12-10T05:58:00.005-05:00

On Tuesday, the NYTimes ran an article about Living Stories. A snippet below:

Google Unveils News-by-Topic Service

Google on Tuesday introduced a new approach to presenting news online by topic, developed with The New York Times and The Washington Post, and said that if the experiment succeeded, it would be made available to all publishers.

For the last half year, an emerging notion in the world of journalism is to focus on ongoing stories instead of "breaking news." This collaboration between Google, the New York Times and the Washington Post is the most elegant implementation of that idea I've seen so far.

To see what I'm talking about you really have to take the click to a sample of the reporting of continuing saga of education reform in Washington DC.

What could this mean for Oce, Screen, HP and any other global who enables digital newspaper production.

From the Atlantic Monthly

it could turn this page into a key learning tool, highlighting the aspects of the debate ( on Healthcare, Afghanistan, education reform )

Consider the power that could be put in the hands of a teacher. By combining the technology that Niiu has launched in Berlin. here. using Oce/Canon printing machines the right story could be delivered at the right time to the right people in the right form - Print.

There is little doubt that the American education is now going through it's greatest reorganization in at least 50 years. The problems of high school dropouts, science and technology and citizenship are coming back to the foreground.

Any method that gets American kids closer to these goals has lots of money available for demonstration projects. Given the new players in K - 12 education, most especially the massive growth of Charter Schools encouraged by the new rules for stimulus money, the path to sales and innovation have never been more accessible.

The particular business models will be different in different places. To me the simplest is versioned newspapers carrying stories on science supported by advertisement from government and NGOs.

I can't see why this doesn't pass the "Why wouldn't I do that" test. Somebody might want to make a call to WaPo, the New York Times, the Guardian or Pearson.

Konica Minolta Receives InfoWorld 100 Awards. I didn't see XRX, HP or Rico on the list

2009-12-09T15:10:00.001-05:00

I keep thinking that Konica is going to take a nibble at Kodak. Only time will tell. Anyway, I really like "from the desktop to the Print shop."

Konica Minolta Receives InfoWorld 100 Award:

"Dec 09, 2009 (PRWeb.com via COMTEX) -- Konica Minolta Business Solutions U.S.A., Inc. (Konica Minolta a leading provider of advanced imaging and networking technologies for the desktop to the print shop, today announced that it was recognized with an IDG InfoWorld 100 award for its innovative CRM initiative, as one of the top 100 IT projects of 2009 For the second year in a row, Konica Minolta was recognized in InfoWorld's highest honor."

If only HP would spin off the Indigo piece, I could bet on them.

2009-12-09T14:30:00.000-05:00

The thing is I hate the computer business. Too much volume, too much competition. Low margins. The print business on the other hand . . .

PSPs switch to HP Indigo based on reliability - Printing Industry News from WhatTheyThink:

"Print service providers (PSPs) from across the United States chose HP solutions such as the HP Indigo 7000 Digital Press and the HP Indigo press 5500 instead of renewing leases on digital presses from other manufacturers. Joining the group of PSPs switching to HP entirely were firms that continue to have some competitive solutions but have added HP Indigo presses to produce their highest-quality digital print products."

Google enters QR code game. Time to evangelize less,implement more.

2009-12-08T07:48:00.004-05:00

Enough data points have gathered in the last couple of weeks to support the idea that QR and other 2d codes will go mainstream in early 2010. The latest news was posting at the Google Blog, yesterday..

Explore a whole new way to window shop, with Google and your mobile phone

12/07/2009 06:00:00 AM
What if you could decide where to shop, eat or hang out, with a little help from local Google users?

It might take you a while to ask them all, so to make it easier we've launched a new effort to send window decals to over 100,000 local businesses in the U.S. that have been the most sought out and researched on Google.com and Google Maps.

We're calling these businesses the "Favorite Places on Google" and you'll now start to find them in over 9,000 towns and cities, in all 50 states. You can also explore a sample of the Favorite Places in 20 of the largest U.S. cities at google.com/favoriteplaces.

Each window decal has a unique bar code, known as a QR code that you can scan with any of hundreds of mobile devices — including iPhone, Android-powered phones, BlackBerry and more — to take you directly to that business's Place Page on your mobile phone. With your mobile phone and these new decals, you can easily go up to a storefront and immediately find reviews, get a coupon if the business is offering one or star a business as a place you want to remember for the future. Soon, you'll be able to leave a review on the mobile page as well, just like on your desktop.

It's been clear for a while that Google's next move was the fight to be the OS of the mobile web. While Apple was first out of the gate with the iPhone, the Droid is now coming to market. Unlike Apple, Google is making it's operating system available on a full range of hand sets.

Whatever the outcome, it's clear that the world is now moving to the stage of hand held computers that take the internet into the real world. Once computing enters the real world, the unique values of print as an interface become apparent. Check out the links in the tweets below, if you want to see what I'm trying to say.

Print products are interfaces to online information - Columbia Journalism Review http://ilnk.me/ab0 and In Brazil vid http://ilnk.me/b64

Pitney Bowes Sets up a Research Center in Connecticut

2009-12-08T07:09:00.000-05:00

Most of the globals have set up demonstration centers. But the following caught my eye. It's so simple. Try it before you buy it.

Pitney Bowes Launches Dynamic Customer Innovation Center for Print Production Solutions

"Shortly, customers will run their own multimedia and transpromo applications and report metrics on test runs to demonstrate return on investment in new technologies.

Score for Ricoh at Clarion University . Why wouldn't every school do that?

2009-12-05T09:14:00.006-05:00

It seems like such a no brainer that it should go on the front of a postcard .

6,000,000 black and white copies & 250,000 color copies.
Before: .06 to .12 per black only copy & .15 to .32 per color
After: .03 to .035 per black only copy & .08 to .09 cents per color

You do the math.

Call or email if you would like to chat. xxx-yyy-zzzz or ABC@xyz.com

Much lower cost of sales than scheduling meetings and getting into a fight with the IT people.

Send the postcard to whoever is in charge of keeping the ship afloat. Send the same postcard for week after week after week. If they don't respond, keep sending out the same postcard to lots of people that might. Week after week after week.

The hard part:
Answer the call if and when it comes on the second ring or the email within an hour.

Printer changes saving Clarion University money:

"Led by President Joseph Grunenwald, the administrative offices in Carrier Hall are leading the way for campus. Most all of the desktop/personal printers, including those in the president's office, have been removed. A Ricoh central printer/copier/scanner, for use by the entire floor has replaced the personal printers. One centralized networked printer will serve as backup per department.

The analysis was eye opening. There were roughly 540 print devices (mostly Hewlett Packard) on campus, which used $60,000 a year in print cartridges. Clarion spends $12-15,000 per year to purchase printers and an additional $4-5,000 per year to maintain the devices. The cost to print from these devices is six to 12 cents per black and white copy and 15 to 32 cents per color copy.

During 2009, a switchover started. Ricoh Equipment installed 27 color/black and white and 44 black and white only copiers on campus. The copy volume during the first year for these 71 machines was almost six million black and white copies and 250,000 color copies. Factoring in the cost of toner, maintenance, and other supplies, the cost per copy was .03 to .035 cents per black and white copy and .08 to .09 cents per color copy.

Erasable Paper from Xerox. Is the perfect for present customers the enemy of the good enough for huge new markets?

2009-12-04T22:41:00.002-05:00

Erasable Paper was announced sometime in 2006. It seems to some like a very long time ago. My guess is that in corporate time it was the day before yesterday.

No doubt it makes "good sense" when viewed from the corporate offices, it needs market research, focus groups and feedback from the channels. Perhaps that is crux of the GUI, Postcript, and Ethernet problem that the awesome engineers at Xerox Research continue to face.

What if a separate business unit were established to bring it to market tomorrow. Will it put stress on legacy business? Yes. Will the purchase of ACS and setting up EPS put stress on present business? Yes.

Clay Christensen has detailed the real problems and real solutions for a global bringing disruptive innovations to market. I have to wonder if the Board and Managers at the mother ship have taken the time to read his stuff.

Metro - Go, go (green) gadgets!:
Published 01:30, December the 3rd, 2009

Bill McKee, of Xerox Canada talks about the erasable paper his company is developing.

How much can we save?
Estimates [say] more than 30 percent of printed office documents will be discarded right after being read.

What is the next step?
The team created a reusable paper that self-erased in about 16 to 24 hours. Customers wanted images to last for more than 24 hours. So, the team currently is working on a second version where images last 3 to 5 days."

The unique value of Print in formal education is about compliance. A culture of compliance is step one.

2009-12-04T05:51:00.002-05:00

Most of the conversation about improving high school education is about content, curriculum and the role of teachers. What is under appreciated is that without a safe orderly school culture none of these issues make much of a difference.

The explanation of a disorderly school culture is now finally changing from "blame the customer."In the world of education at the bottom of the pyramid in the States this most often manifests as the "these students come from dysfunctional ..." Or "these students have learning disabilities." While it is true that some very small percentage of students have medically derived learning disabilities, most of those diagnosed as such do not.

At the middle and top of the pyramid the problem most usually presents as drug or alcohol use. Again there are a very small percentage of students who have significant problems. But the fact is that most are kids who get into trouble when they are bored. If they are not identified very early, the cascade of bad decisions get them into very bad situations.

As in medicine so it is in education. The most sustainable, fastest and least expensive solution is early detection. As a culture of compliance builds, it is easier and easier to have the time for early detection of going forward sub optimal paths.

That's where print connected to the web comes in.

3 tweets
For the role of Print in edtech see min 3:53 of this vid. http://ilnk.me/ca9 "we will have an Ipod Use contract that goes to parents."

Only Print (and TV) mediums enable shared communication events. For compliance in K -12 the act of signing a document creates culture.

When print is connected to the web with 2d codes that can be clicked with a cell phone, it can emit behavioral data for early interventions.

The Medium is the Message
The way I read McCluhan is that the medium creates an experience separate from the content communicated in the medium. The experience of signing a contract on iPod use in the classroom creates the shared experience of parent and child that says "I agree to these rules. And you (the kid) know that I expect these rules to be followed."

When the person with less power in a situation knows that the person with power expects something to happen AND has a piece of paper that will exist and can be easily referred to in the future, it's the first step to creating a culture of compliance.

The second step is to create the plausible expectation that failure to comply will be seen in very close to real time. That's where print connected to the web through 2d codes comes in. The very first signs of non compliance in attendance or homework compliance can trigger just the right intervention, early enough to make a difference without heroic efforts.

Printers are in the infrastructure business. It's a good business.

2009-12-03T08:48:00.004-05:00

from Printweek.com
Cats Solutions acquires LDSI to create £15m-turnover group

Cats Solutions, the digital print and print management company, has bought the business and principal assets of Legal Document Services International (LDSI) to create a £15m-turnover group.
The equity-based acquisition, the details of which have not yet been disclosed, is intended to create a "market leader in the provision of managed print, scanning and electronic data discovery services to the legal sector".

Since at least September, 2006, I've been on the same little soapbox.

What business are you in? is a multiple choice question.
A. Infrastructure
B. Personal service
C. Creative

It's interesting this is another case of a "print management company" doing the buying. Makes sense if the "value is the network." It's consistent with the most successful users of digital marketing techniques have been mailing houses that clipped on the print manufacturing. Or a company like Color Central that prints for Lulu.com. Everybody gets the hype about lulu. Color Central gets the clicks. Infrastructure is about clicks not hype.

The recent "market service provider" meme was a very wrong turn. If you already supplying a market service buying or partnering with a printer is easy. The wrong headed notion is that printers should fundamentally move away from the skill and experience they have earned in manufacturing print, at scale and on time.

Many in the industry have been taken in by the noise of "marketing" "internet blabla" and have been blind to the defensible value of manufacturing. As America is finally moving back to a manufacturing, business model innovation powerhouse, this meme should quietly fade away.

Score for RR Donnelly! Gets Verizon statement printing.

2009-12-02T14:17:00.001-05:00

RR Donnelley Verizon Deal -
| Graphic Arts Online:

"RR Donnelley wins expanded $100 million contract for Verizon Wireless statement printing. RR Donnelley says its proprietary high-speed inkjet printing technology helped it win a $100 million multi-year extension on a contract for statement printing with Verizon Wireless.

Verizon Wireless, a joint venture with Vodaphone, is the largest U.S. cell phone and communications company, claiming 89 miillion U.S. customers."

What happens when the grownups in Tokyo get together with the grownups in Venlo?

2009-12-02T10:31:00.003-05:00

In my not so humble opinion, they will act on the reality that in the new normal global economy the value is in the network and commodities. That could mean that there will be a business strategy that unlocks the value of the DNN and 1 to 1 newspapers.

Canon has product dna. Oce has product dna. They both make killer app products. Oce is the box and production infrastructure for Niiu in Berlin. If you've visited my blog before, you probably know that I think that Niiu is the best example so far of connecting the mass of content on the web with the power of hyperlocal print delivery.

It is the next big thing for Print.

Oce has a huge lead in global digital book and newspaper production.

My bet is that while everyone is still running after the shrinking pie of direct mail, the new Oce division of Canon will go after industrial strength infrastructure printing. When the grown ups are back in charge, the game changes.

Consider what's going on at the Federal level in the States.

Another score for Xerox ( UK). Insource, outsource. Doesn't matter if you get the clicks.

2009-12-02T08:01:00.002-05:00

On October 25, Printweek posted

Manor Creative changes hands under MBO
Manor Creative print and design company has been taken over in a management buyout (MBO). The MBO team, led by new chief executive Graham Brownett, brokered the deal with the help of the Royal Bank of Scotland's Structured Debt Solutions division.
Brownett told printweek.com that the new team would ring the changes at Manor Creative, starting with the environment. "We are doing a lot of work on our environmental policies towards gaining the BS 8555 environmental standard," he said.

Today I found the following:

Manor Creative moves into digital with iGen4 buy
"Manor Creative has brought digital printing in-house with an investment in a Xerox iGen4 and the launch of a new division. Manor Digital will offer an on-demand printing service for its clients and service contracts that were previously outsourced.

Nice Xerox story about Biz Development

2009-12-01T07:44:00.002-05:00

The value of the globals is their networks of smart. As boxes get better and better, the competition drives margins lower and lower. The defensible value is the network that surrounds the box. More smart is much nicer than less smart.

Found this one by Gina Testa at Output Links

Progressive Communications, based in Florida, had its light production Xerox DocuColor 242 Digital Color Printer/Copier just six months when it recognized a larger opportunity. . .

According to Xerox Business Development Consultant Mickey Call, they also needed to do the necessary planning and training to make the investment pay off.

..Call began helping them prepare well in advance of the Igen3’s installation.

He met with the Progressive Communications sales team for three months preparing them to use the more consultative approach that’s required for selling personalized communications programs.

Their business is doing so well that they are adding a second iGen press.

RISO is more interesting every day

2009-12-01T07:28:00.001-05:00

Riso got on my radar a while ago. I don't know enough about CPC pricing in the real world, but if RISO delivers what they say, why wouldn't everyone do that?

From OutputLinks:
With a color cost that is typically one to two cents per page, . . Add to the equation the monochrome cost of less than a half-cent per page and this concept becomes even more compelling.. . a $50,000 ComColor system

MPS in education is not just about cutting costs, it's about a Printer in every school building and education informatics.

2009-11-30T05:36:00.005-05:00

I said:
If an independent #MPS integrated zinepal.com http://ilnk.me/b8a , they could offer blogs or wikis in print to the classroom printed on MFP

He said:
zinepal @ToughLoveforX What is a #MPS? I am working on a zinepal.com API to allow others to integrate with it. Looking for good usage examples...

I said:
@zinepal how good to know you are on twitter! MPS is "Managed Print Services" it's the growing part of the print industry. 1 of 2

@zinepal MPS means that every copier is an output device for PDF. That means 1 to 1 instructional collateral produced in the school building.

@zinepal just one more for now. A class does writing on a blog or wiki. zinepal delivers PDFs. The edited writing is output in print.

He said:
zinepal @ToughLoveforX Cool. Sounds interesting. Thanks for the info!

If zinepal is working on APIs for Cloud based translation of HTML content into PDF, he might be a good person to get in contact with. According to his twitter page, he's in British Columbia.

As the Printers in the enterprise are connected to the Printers outside the enterprise, it's another step closer to the realization of true distribute and print, or what might be called a network of printernets.

In the emerging global economy the high margin values are in the network, not the output box. If MPS or EPS brings a new networked delivery system for Print directly into the classroom it should be possible to get to some kind of sustainable margins going forward.

If upload codes are integrated into the PDFs the network can emit the raw material for the only defensible high margin product - predictive analytics. In the education business that means education informatics. Education informatics means real time evidence to improve education with less danger of falling prey to the Flaw of Averages.

If you don't believe me about QR in 1to30 newspapers to replace textbooks, maybe this video from Brazil will show you want I mean.

2009-11-26T11:35:00.003-05:00

Instead of a book, consider a very similar experience in a 24 page black and white newspaper delivered to a classroom. That's why the title says 1 to 30. Then consider the cost of a black only newspaper that had content that was aligned with education standards and supported by ads from public health and ngos.

Oce figured out crowdsourced R&D. Someone should get this on Ms Burn's radar. It could do wonders for STEP.

2009-11-25T11:47:00.001-05:00

To read full article at printweek.com

My favorite parts:

"...this closed attitude has been replaced by an approach that explicitly creates room for partners in the development of new products. Open innovation, as the platform for making maximum use of each others' core competencies, forms the basis for a new period of future innovations."

For example, in the Netherlands, the website Dutch Lwww.battleofconcepts.com (google English translate version) allows businesses and government agencies to tap into the country's freshest brains. It works like this: a company poses a question or challenge to an audience of students and young professionals up to the age of 30. This is the ‘battle'. Students then submit their ‘concepts', or solutions, in return. Responses are anonymised and the company chooses the 20 best answers.

The prize money attached to each particular challenge, which can be between €2,500 and €10,000, is then distributed according to a standard scale. Financial services provider Rabobank recently offered a €5,000 carrot for clever ideas to help it engage with entrepreneurs and business start-ups via social media.

Getting margins is about pre press business processes and Finishing

2009-11-23T06:08:00.002-05:00

Offset and digital printing machines get better and better. Squeezing more efficiency in the face of over capacity is a tough road.

Business processes, on the other hand, are full of inefficiencies, that's the web 2 print piece. in my not-so-humble opinion, finishing is the low hanging fruit. Closed loop automated production means a finished product at the end of the process. Press sheets are easy. Finished products in the customers hands is hard.

Value and therefore margins comes from making the hard, easy.

Roll fed digital presses without the ability to output a finished newspaper are missing the boat. That's one of the reasons I bought Oce at $3.10.

Finishing features from printweek.com |
"Our features archive boasts a wealth of information on making finishing create value in your business. You'll find our roundup below."

Quark goes into web 2 print. Teams up with AlphaGraphics and Franchise Services. What ever happened to white label Marketsplash?

2009-11-22T06:39:00.006-05:00

AlphaGraphics Teams Up with Quark for QuarkPromote.com
Salt Lake City, UT- AlphaGraphics, Inc., announced today its partnership with Quark to provide professional marketing collateral for small and mid-sized businesses seeking to start and grow their companies. The new online service, called QuarkPromote.com, launched yesterday at an event held in Denver, Colorado.

Quark Press release A:

Quark announced today the launch of QuarkPromote.com, a new online service that helps entrepreneurs and small businesses in the United States easily create their own high-quality, professional marketing materials that can be picked up at a nearby neighborhood printer or received by mail in just a few days.

Press release B
According to Terry Welty, vice president of corporate marketing for Quark, "The Web to Print market we are entering is a $17 billion market. Small businesses are increasingly going online to find an easy way to create and print marketing materials. In the next three years this market is going to double and we think QuarkPromote.com in concert with our print partners is going to be a big part of this."

Franchise Services, parent company of Sir Speedy, PIP and Signal Graphics, announces that its brands are part of the QuarkPromote.com Neighborhood Print Partner program. The program will provide Sir Speedy, PIP, and Signal Graphics centers the opportunity to gain new customers by receiving print orders online.

Several Sir Speedy, PIP and Signal Graphics locations across the country have already signed up to join the program and many more are expected before the end of this year.

Maybe Kyocera or HP will take a nibble at Kodak

2009-11-20T11:13:00.001-05:00

Turned up a November 16 article.

11/16 post; "SNS Securities said HP & Kyocera had sufficient financing options for a counter bid for Oce" http://ilnk.me/a39

So if they have enough money for Oce, they have enough money for the Kodak print piece.

The web and printed books can play nicely together.

2009-11-20T10:01:00.002-05:00

- Technology and Learning - Inside Higher Ed:

"When we get to a point that a mobile version is expected of whatever content we want to interact with, not having a mobile version may cut-off the desire to consume that content.

People who teach courses, and those of us who also work with people who design and teach courses, need to recognize that we are more likely to succeed in having our students engage with the curricular content if our students can access this content on a platform that they choose.

Students are amongst the busiest people on earth. Perhaps they will be more likely to read an assigned chapter if they can grab some snippets during those 'in-between' times on their mobile device. Later they can crawl up for extended times with the paper book, or on an e-reader, the point is to offer choice."

Maybe KBA will take a nibble at Kodak?

2009-11-20T07:45:00.001-05:00

KBA eyes new business lines as rival manufacturers post losses
printweek.com
William Mitting, printweek.com, 20 November 2009

Press manufacturer KBA is to move into solar energy and water treatment technology as it seeks to diversify, rather than 'enter a merger in a shrinking market'.

Speaking after the company said that it would explore 'new fields of operation', chief executive Helge Hansen said that, while print manufacturing would remain core, the company would explore acquisitions in 'new business lines with good prospects for growth and earnings'.

He identified these sectors as packaging, digital print, water treatment and solar thermal technology."

It's pretty clear that something has to give at Kodak. The transition from the film business to another business has been brutal. They've made a great run and have created some great pockets of value. But the money has pretty much run out. The Kodak Gallery is a jewel. Gezillions of users have stored their high res photos. It should have a very long tail. The Kodak moment is still the sustainable margin deliverable.

Meanwhile the Creo Scitex piece is a jewel in it's own right. I assume, but don't know, that Creo gives Kodak a strong lead in the offset workflow. Scitex dna gives them deep expertise and knowledge in inkjet. Sooner or later Stream will come to market. But what could have been a first mover advantage is gone.

This week Kodak's market cap was $1.1 billion dollars. That is less than the cost plus assumption of debt that Canon is offering for Oce. It's less than Ricoh paid for Ikon. Meanwhile, Kodak owns KKR $700 million dollars. I just can't see KKR waiting patiently for a return.

This week had a big surprise with the Canon offer. The following weeks promise to be interesting as the inevitable reorganization of the global print industry continues.

"Canon and Oce" by Cary Sherburne. I don't have a lot to add.

2009-11-20T02:28:00.002-05:00

The tweet.

"Canon and Océ: More Details" by Cary Sherburne @WhatTheyThink http://ilnk.me/a11

HP India and most everyone else takes a hit. Canon and Epson India market share up .

2009-11-19T15:06:00.001-05:00

One has to wonder what Oce's possiblities might be in India where print is most definitely not even close to being dead.

HP India Loses Printers Market Share in Q3:

CRN Network, November 19, 2009, 1030

Market leader HP saw negative growth of nearly 32 percent in Q3 2009 in the printers, copiers and MFP segment, shaving off almost 10 percent of its market share during the period, according to a latest Gartner report.

The biggest market share gainer has been Canon, which posted a 48 percent growth in overall printer shipments thus growing its market share from 11 percent in Q3 2008 to 19 percent in Q3 2009." Epson too saw a growth of 14 percent in unit shipments.

On the other hand, several other top-tier vendors experienced significant shipment declines in the Q3 of 2009. Shipment declines by vendors such as Xerox with a 58 percent decrease, followed by Panasonic with 39 percent, HP at 32 per cent, Brother with 28 percent and Samsung Electronics with 21 per cent decline primarily contributed to overall decline of the market.

Roger Belanger, Director, GossRSVP, LLC has it just right about interactive print

2009-11-18T12:30:00.003-05:00

The common wisdom is that sales are motivated by fear and greed. In my experience, for a going enterprise, decisions are made in the service of managing risk, or what might be more clearly referred to as fear.

Now that newspaper management is more afraid of losing control - through a bankruptcy or a buy out - the time may finally be right for them to get over the legitimate competing fear that "the emperor has no clothes. "

Roger Belanger, Goss RSVP clarifies the situation in much more palatable language.

From the Goss RSVP blog:

We see two main factors that continue to hold back the growth of interactive print. The first I believe is a myth and the second an opportunity.

First we continue to see reluctances by publishers, especially newspapers, wanting to allow metrics to be part of their offering. They seem scared they will loose advertisers or advertisers will be able to leverage the cost they pay for an ad if their ad only gets a few hits in a given print publication. Though one would like to say print metrics and page views are one in the same they are not. Just like on the internet, there are millions of pages that get seen everyday, but not clicked on. But the ones that do get clicked on some metrics are provided, great!
So if print publishers can break this mind set, or myth, and separate ad sales from the fear that metrics will erode sales, we believe then interactive print technology will really take off.
Secondly, publishing & editorial tools do not have interactive features as part of their front end offerings, thus making it a bit more expensive & cumbersome to add after the fact. This is mainly a technology issue, but more importantly an opportunity for the print publishing industry to capitalize

Hendrik and Wanja invented Newspaper 3.0 in Berlin

2009-11-18T06:12:00.006-05:00

On Monday, November 16, , Hendrik Tiedemann and Wanja S. Oberhof launched Niiu in Berlin. Since I am illiterate in German I have to depend on Google Translate. It was reported in Germanin Germany in column by FOCUS-Online-author Claudia Frickel . The article in Google Translate English is here.

The subscribers will select up to 14 on the clock "Niiu" homepage by clicking, what content it wants to read. He can currently access to 17 local and national newspapers, including American and one Russian.The reader may also select specific departments and determine how many pages he wants from the respective newspaper - but not search for individual articles. Incorporated in each case is the complete page, including advertisements. The areas of interest can change daily.

In addition, the "Niiu" can be supplemented with Internet content from about 500 portals . On the last page for example, information is collected from blogs or printed Facebook messages from friends.

If interested in the business model for education, check out the previous post including the comments. If interested in the commercial model, consider that predictive analytics on consumer behavior is the high margin deliverable for print. Then think about the analytics possible if you have a data base that tells you what a user thinks is interesting.

If you add QR codes,
it means you can drill down even further to see which articles were interesting enough for the user to make the click to the web. You could also tell an advertiser exactly when and where the user clicked on an ad.

Yesterday the newspaper world changed in Berlin. Tomorrow the "textbook" world in the States. Go Oce! + Canon ? WOW.

2009-11-17T11:58:00.001-05:00

The story is from Deutsche Welle | 16.11.2009: You can read the full story at the click.

Customized 'Niiu' newspaper launched |
"'Every Niiu is only printed once for every reader. You can also add the logo of your favorite soccer club or something like that,' he said.

Several German newspapers and magazines at a kioskBildunterschrift: Gro�ansicht des Bildes mit der Bildunterschrift: Newsprint is having an existential crisis

In effect, Niiu allows the reader to be his own editor, choosing the news he or she wants from the company's website. The price is not much more than the newsstand price of most German papers - 1.80 euros ($2.70).

Oberhof continues: 'I can say I want the front page of a regional newspaper, for example the Tagesspiegel from Berlin. And then I can say I want the sports section of the Bild and politics from "

The point is that the same technology makes versioned newspapers simple to adapt to fill the vacuum created by the end of textbooks.

Consider that instead of the reader, a teacher chooses just the right content for next week. Add QR codes and you get performance metrics that allow detecting early warning signs of a student at risk.

Add some quizzes, some links to YouTube Edu and reserve 2 pages for student writing and art.

It's done.

OutputLinks on Canon & Oce. There's a new 800 pound gorilla in the world of Print.

2009-11-17T07:26:00.001-05:00

The smart people at OutputLinks, see the same thing I think I see. The story is at
Canon and Oce to Create Global Leader in Printing Industry.

The money sentence:

Canon and Océ aim to create the overall No. 1 presence in the printing industry;

I can't see a reason why they couldn't do it. My only problem is that it sounds like I'm going to have to tender my Oce shares. It was fun while it lasted.

Canon to acquire Oce . Ricoh took Ikon. Canon fights back. What will Fuji do?

2009-11-16T08:23:00.002-05:00

It shouldn't be that surprising.

The titans of print are based in Tokyo. The yen is playing under new rules after the recent election in Japan. Oce owns the HVTO space and is first to play in versioned newspapers. With their history of the DNN they have first mover advantage. Today, Nov 16, the really disruptive innovation for versioned and personalized newspapers goes live in Berlin. http://ilnk.me/47e

But it's too late for Oce get a space on the desktop or the CRD. On top of it all, Canon took a big hit from Ricoh when they bought IKON and replaced the Canon boxes with Ricoh boxes.

What's next?
What I'm seeing is that outsourced print and insourced print will just be print. That's what Xerox EPS is about. Given that KKR has recently joined the party, Kodak will probably spin off the Creo and Scitex piece to focus on their core dna in photo and the consumer space.

The last remaining question is what will HP do? I'm hoping they will spin off the Indigo piece so that it can get the focus it needs to be number one in commercial digital printing.

But whatever happens next, it's pretty clear to me that today, the printernet took a huge step forward.

Canon in £655m bid to acquire Océ
Tim Sheahan, printweek.com, 16 November 2009

Canon is set to acquire Oce after making a 730m euro ($655m) cash offer for the digital press manufacturer.

Japan-based Canon has made an offer of €8.60 per Oce share, which represents a premium of 70% more than the company's closing share price at the end of play on 13 November, valuing the company at €730m.

The deal hinges on the offer being accepted by Oc�s ordinary shareholders, a decision that has been fully recommended by the company's board."

Oce, Infoprint, Riso and HP go to Washington

2009-11-16T06:15:00.003-05:00

For anyone who has followed my blog for a while, you know that I think the real opportunities for the revival of Print are in the fields of education, health and government. Not in marketing.
In fact, I've been on the same little soapbox since 2005. So it makes sense that the story in Outputlinks would catch my attention.

HP, Oce, Infoprint was to be expected. RISO at the table surprised me a bit. But as far as I can tell Xerox didn't participate. That's interesting.

From Outputlinks:

On November 4, INTERQUEST hosted the 2009 Digital Printing in Government and Higher Education Forum, with nearly 100 attendees from federal, state, and local government, and colleges and universities.

The event kicked off with a morning session geared toward both environments. Speakers from leading printing systems vendors shared their companies' strategies, product offerings, and initiatives in these markets. Speakers included Jim Strief, Eastern Regional Manager for Hewlett-Packard's Publications Sector for High Speed Inkjet and Indigo; Jay Ainslie, Americas Director for Software, Services and Solutions Marketing for the InfoPrint Solutions Company; Bryan Beauchamp, Vice President of Business Development and Federal Sales for Océ Document Printing Systems Division; and David Murphy, Vice President of Marketing for RISO Inc.

The forum was sponsored by leading industry players, including Cascades, Hewlett-Packard, InfoPrint Solutions Company, Kodak, MGI, Océ, Rimage, and RISO, with additional support from American Printer, the Association of College and University Mail Services, Inc. (ACUMS), the Federal Electronic Document Systems Association (FEDS), the Franklin Technical Society (FTS) In-plant Graphics, the Interagency Council on Printing & Publications Services (ICPPS), the National Association of College and University Mail Services (NACUMS), the National Government Publishing Association (NGPA), the University Mail Managers Association (UMMA), and the Xplor Mid Atlantic Region (MAR).

"Sign and Graphic Imaging Middle East 2010 off to a great start"

2009-11-15T09:56:00.002-05:00

This may be just pre show hype or it might be real. Consider the attendance for Print 09, then consider what they say from the Middle East. Based the value of the Australian currency and after having read Re-Orient, 1998 by Andre Gunder Frank, my bet is that it's for real.

Sign and Graphic Imaging Middle East 2010 off to a great start | Sign & Graphic Imaging (SGI) | AMEinfo.com:

"Now in its 12th year, Sign and Graphic Imaging Middle East 2010 (SGI) is enjoying a steady flow of international and regional exhibitor registrations, which will match if not surpass participation at SGI 2009 despite the economic downturn."

Now it's Flickr + HP (Snapfish) Anyone else seeing the pattern

2009-11-14T09:07:00.001-05:00

Flickr and HP’s Snapfish Team on Photo Printing:

"Users will be able to order standard prints from images in their Flickr photostreams, but will also be able to create calendars, cards, books, collages, and canvas prints."

Here's the cool part.

. Flickr users in the United States will also have the option to pick up their photos locally at Snapfish retail partners, which include brick-and-mortar operations like Walmart, Staples, and Walgreens.

Who gets the clicks?
Will it be best of class in HP's Indigo fleet? Will it be CGX? If the volumes increase I bet it could be a sustainable revenue stream for an HP printernet. http://ilnk.me/8bc

Fuji Xerox to double China sales on recovering demand . Reorient just goes on and on.

2009-11-14T07:31:00.001-05:00

In 1998 Andre Gunder Frank wrote Re-Orient. It's worth re reading today.

China Business News: Fuji Xerox to double China sales on recovering demand:

"Nov. 13, 2009 (China Knowledge) - Fuji Xerox Co Ltd, the world's leading provider of document processing products, aims to double its China sales every two years, thanks to recovering demand for office equipment in the country and the company's direct sales method, President Tadahito Yamamoto said on Wednesday, Reuters reported.

The company expects its China sales to reach US$535 million for the year ending in March 2010, said the president.

Fuji Xerox has three development and manufacturing plants in Shanghai, Shenzhen and Suzhou, and a sales office in Shanghai.

Fuji Xerox is a 75:25 joint venture between the Japanese photographic firm Fuji Photo Film Co and the American document management company Xerox"

New Canon showroom tipped as UK's largest

2009-11-14T06:13:00.001-05:00

New Canon showroom tipped as UK's largest - 12 Nov 2009 - CRN:

"Velmex Distribution has moved to larger Surrey premises, including a 80m2 to 90m2 showroom for Canon large-format demonstrations claimed to be the largest in the UK.

Mark Keeley, managing director of the distributor, said it was continuing to expand as favourable yen rates versus the euro, alongside product innovation, were helping it get a leg-up over wide-format rivals.

“We are managing to expand in a shrinking market that has been dominated by HP and Epson. We are taking them on and doing well,” he said."

But I thought I read that in the States, Canon production machinery is going to be available from HP networks.

What a complicated world.

Save the Children Elects Anne M. Mulcahy as Chair of the Board

2009-11-14T05:58:00.001-05:00

In my not so humble opinion, the children that need saving quickest in the States are the high school kids who have a really good chance of winding up in jail, because the early warning systems in bottom of the pyramid high schools are awful.

Personalized PDFs with links to CMS systems on the web can make a huge difference. Hopefully someone will get it on her radar.

Save the Children Elects Anne M. Mulcahy as Chair of the Board:

"WESTPORT, CT -- 11/12/09 -- Save the Children today announced that Anne M. Mulcahy, Chairman of Xerox Corporation (NYSE: XRX), has been elected Chair of the Board of Trustees, effective March 2, 2010.

Xippa says "look carefully at your equipment leases. Consider Identity theft. "

2009-11-13T12:43:00.003-05:00

Xippa says:

Copier Contracts need to guard against identity theft. Many Copier Companies charge an "inflated" fee for replacing and putting in a clean hard drive at lease end. By building it into you are better served.

Press Copy to have your Identity Stolen
By Melissa Yeager, WINK News Florida
Story Updated: Nov 12, 2009 at 8:53 PM EST

"56 percent of people victims of ID theft have no idea how perpetrators got their ID," said Sean O'Leary of Digital Copier Security, "And we can assume a portion or large is a result of data breeches from photocopiers."

O'Leary says he believes most companies don't realize their copy machines have hard drives.

"We just take it for granted this little photocopier sitting in the corner of an office is safe and innocuous," said O'Leary, "But in reality with that hard drive its storing personal information."

Today's copy machines do a whole lot more than copy. They print. They scan. They email. They fax. The machine has to have a way to remember all that information. Between 1998 and 2002, companies began equipping copy machines with hard drives.

O'Leary says most companies lease their copy machines. He suspects most have no idea when they trade in their old copier, they're also turning over a whole lot of personal information.

"If you think about it, when you go to a new employer you start a new job first they they do in your orientation is they take a copy of your drivers license and your social security card," said O'Leary, "And that information is maintained on that photocopier so it basically becomes an identity theft's dream."

From the UK: Are short, personalised runs the future for magazines and Oce in Berlin, Nov 16.

2009-11-13T08:15:00.003-05:00

Reader Reaction: Are short, personalised runs the future for magazines? |
printweek.com
PrintWeek, 13 November 2009
Following Wikia's deal with HP's MagCloud, we ask if personalised magazines are the future"

FYI :
HP today announced on Oct 21, 2009 Wikia, the company that brings together millions of people to create and discover engaging content on every topic, will offer print-on-demand services to its communities through MagCloud, an HP cloud service that automates magazine publishing.

Some comments from Printweek:

but in terms of genuine news media, they will be too expensive to distribute, even if they are relatively cheap to produce.

I can’t really comprehend how you would personalise an entire run.

If it’s got your name on it, or has been tailored to your interests, it’s far more engaging. If done well and the industry leans that way, then I think short-run personalised magazines are the way to go. An increasing number of newspaper readers are going online to read the content they want and publishers are updating their websites more frequently to cater for their readers. The future of personalised digitally-printer magazines really depends though on the technology and the costs of production coming down.

On the other hand, consider this story from Time Magazine:

The paper, called Niiu, is all about consumer choice: it gives readers the freedom to choose the types of articles they want to read, culled from a wide range of German and international news sources.

After registering on Niiu's website, niiu.de, readers can access other newspapers online and select the pages or sections they find interesting, designing their own specialized paper. But instead of reading it online, Niiu is printed overnight and delivered to the subscriber's door the next morning . . .

KBA and looking at the Global Economy using the lens of Print

2009-11-13T07:50:00.003-05:00

KBA got on my radar sometime last week, with the announcement that they moved there headquaters to Texas. From what I can see Texas is the place in the States where it's happening.

The more interesting thing is that following the print industry is a good lens on the most massive shift in the global economy in 500 years. In 1998 Andre Gunder Frank wrote Re-Orient. It's worth re reading today.

At any rate, here's what came up today.

Knig & Bauer AG - quarterly profit in a challenging year | PrintersLounge:

"Buoyant demand in China helped boost exports to Asia and the Pacific from 19.1% to 23.5% of the group total. The figure for Africa and Latin America was well above the historic average at 17.2%, while the percentage of sales generated in the weak North American market remained obstinately low at 7.9%."

StreamServe, Twitter exchange with XMpie, Turning education into a profit center and Helping high school kids.

2009-11-13T06:37:00.004-05:00

The StreamServe piece

StreamServe Learning program expands with online training - Printing Industry News from WhatTheyThink:
"BURLINGTON, Mass., USA – StreamServe, Inc., a leading provider of business communication solutions, today announced that it has added a unique, new online training environment to its StreamServe Learning program. Currently available, this new e-learning environment offers on-demand tools and capabilities to StreamServe's worldwide list of over 5,000 customers and partners.

With on-demand access, trainees can gather, review and act upon information they need on StreamServe's products whenever and wherever it is convenient for them. In addition, the newly enhanced training program will now allow users to review and receive advanced training in Live Expert sessions, ensuring that they receive a complete understanding of the material.

The new StreamServe Learning program also supports Web 2.0 communications, such as forums, chat rooms, video, etc., further enticing collaboration among participants."

The XMpie Piece

@davidbaldaro Exactly. IMO, printers don't need education. They need leads and a pool of trained people ready to work. "schools" are 2 slow.

@davidbaldaro Consider if Xmpie tried to help with #HSdropouts by teaching them on line to use xmpie. Do well, by doing good.

@davidbaldaro Good to hear. What might happen if ed were seen from a social entreprenuer POV to focus on the bottom of the pyramid. 1 more.

@@davidbaldaro The best way to learn is to teach. xmpie pros in printshops mentor hs kids on line and get some edu money to the printer.

The doing well by doing good piece

johnfoleyjr Looking forward to visiting with @toughloveforx at LGA. QR codes and education here we come....

If you think this is just pie-in-sky.
Follow the links to the National Association of Scholars at Princeton University.

"2025: residential colleges that managed to stay afloat during the online winnowing did so by dint of . . ." http://ilnk.me/18f

KBA scores with the University of Houston and in Sweden on the same day.

2009-11-12T18:58:00.002-05:00

KBA got on my radar last Friday. Today I found this:

University of Houston In-Plant Print Shop upgrades with KBA - Printing Industry News from WhatTheyThink:
"KBA North America, a global press manufacturer based in Dallas, Texas, announces that the Printing and Postal Service Department at the University of Houston is providing higher quality and faster turnaround with the installation of its KBA Performa 74 20 x 29-inch four-color press with aqueous coater and dryer."

And also this:

Frontprint from Arlöv near Malmö/Sweden orders 3rd large-format offset press from KBA http://ilnk.me/841

Put one on the board for Xerox EPS. Sure sounds like BPO to me.

2009-11-12T18:57:00.001-05:00

I love 9 year contracts. Go Ursula Burns!

Ingersoll Rand to reap cost savings with Xerox Enterprise Print Services -

"ROCHESTER, N.Y. – Xerox Corporation will manage global print operations at Ingersoll Rand, saving the diversified industrial firm millions by better managing company-wide print spend.

The nine-year Enterprise Print Services (EPS) contract brings multiple output devices, print budgets and vendor support systems under Xerox management."

RISO just keeps on, keeping on. MVTO is smart.

2009-11-12T08:16:00.002-05:00

Riso got on my radar a while ago. Today I found this:

RISO stakes claim as leading provider of high-speed cut-sheet inkjet systems -
"Danvers, MA – RISO, Inc., a leader in digital printing technology, today introduced a new website dedicated to educating the document production marketplace about Mid-Volume Transactional Output (MVTO). RISO has defined the mid-volume transaction output segment as transactional printing (invoices, bills, statements, notices, checks, letters, etc.) in the range of 50,000 to five million pages per month."

Me and Barb Pellow see the same thing. Maybe we're right?

2009-11-10T07:53:00.004-05:00

It seems that jasonpinto on Twitter also thinks it's important.

jasonpinto RT @ToughLoveForX -Barb Pellow at Output Links http://ilnk.me/7b4 "Today’s AR makes print the ultimate in interactive media. "

Anyone who has followed my bloviating knows that I think adding 2d Codes, either as QR, CodeZQR, GossRSVP or any of the others that are emerging in the market place, is the next stage of print.

Since a picture is worth a ....

Getting from here to there will take another little while. But the power of transpromo for incoming information creates the metrics that CMOs need. As it becomes common knowledge, the pent up demand for print is unleashed.

As smart phones and technology keep advancing it's only a matter of time. Given how fast things move it might be much sooner, rather than later.

If a publisher can become a printer, why can't a printer become a publisher?

2009-11-10T05:59:00.001-05:00

Think about how much content is trapped on the internet yearning to be delivered in Print.

Print21:
"'We have undertaken an exhaustive analysis of the printing options available to us and it became clear during the process there were compelling reasons to take control of the production of our publications,' Law said.

The decision drew criticism from PMP’s former CEO, Brian Evans, who claimed that: “These guys aren't printers … this is a tall order for them.” In a report in the Australian Financial Review last month, some printing executives doubted that the print centre would be complete by 2011.

But in an interview with Print21, John Rowsthorne, general manager operations at PBL Media, hit back at these allegations, confirming that the printing centre was on track, though he declined to offer a date. 'We are still proceeding,' he said. 'We have a time frame in place and are proceeding as planned.'"

If Xerox Foundation got together with Staples Foundation, they could both do well by doing good.

2009-11-09T08:19:00.000-05:00

Instead of "giving" money to non profits, they could supply seed money to social entrepreneurial startups to use Print and the web to help mitigate the high school dropout epidemic.

Staples Foundation for Learning Awards Nearly $300,000 in Grants to Support Educational Programs for Disadvantaged Youth:

"FRAMINGHAM, Mass.--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Staples Foundation for Learning (SFFL), a private foundation created by Staples, Inc., (NASDAQ: SPLS) announced today it has awarded 29 grants totaling $287,875 to non-profit organizations dedicated to helping youth throughout the country.

These organizations were selected for their commitment to providing educational programs that help at-risk youth develop the skills and confidence necessary to become responsible adults and future community leaders."

Photoshop for Android Smart Phones

2009-11-09T07:37:00.003-05:00

Note the QR code in the advert.

Adobe is bringing a mobile version of their award winning software to Android Phones with Photoshop.com Mobile:

More at phandroid.com

Textbooks break in Texas. Steve Dowling, Pearson calls it "a tipping point"

2009-11-08T05:54:00.004-05:00

I've been on my little soapbox about textbooks for a long time. All the blabla is going to be about digital this and that. They're wrong.

The real story is :

At the core of the new order, resulting from new legislation, lie three fundamental transfers of power and money:
from the State Board of Education to the Commissioner of the Texas Education Agency;
from three major textbook conglomerates to a broad array of computer hardware and digital content providers;
and from the state to school districts.

The full story is at The Texas Tribune: It didn't make any sense to repost here.

The opportunity is for versioned and personalized print, with 2D codes that connect to the web. What some seniors at Cal Poly are calling interactive print.

The Tipping Point: Texas Textbook Politics Meets the Digital Revolution |

“. . I’ve been at this 40 years, have been characterized as Luddites and other things not mentionable at a public hearing,” said Steve Dowling, a top executive at educational publishing giant Pearson, during a legislative grilling earlier this year. “But the truth is, we actually have moved a good bit of our content to digital . . . The challenge is, this is a slow market. It moves faster in the consumer space than it does where we are in education … But I think we’re – you know, the Malcolm Gladwell thing – at a tipping point.”"

Added Monday 11/9 6:28 AM EDT
What's the content?
It's possible the textbook giants will figure it out fast enough, but if not a disruptive model for journalism has emerged in Texas.

From Forbes:

the Tribune will partner with 10 newspapers and six TV stations to distribute content. In the works is a Tribune series called a "Texas Politics Minute," expected to air three times a week.

Anyone else notice that so much cool stuff comes out of Texas? KBA in Dallas.

2009-11-06T07:08:00.002-05:00

It sounds to me that KBA users group has it just right. It's exactly what I would expect from the industrial newspaper part of the business. Sooner or later, I'm hoping the newspaper folks see the business opportunity in using newspaper product to fill the vacuum created by the implosion of the textbook industry.

Consider the information density and close to real time delivery that is just a part of doing business for a printed newspaper. With the new technologies, they have exactly the right infrastructure to deliver content to schools, supported by advertising by NGO's, health and social service agencies.

The path is to personalized newspapers. The Nov 16th launch in Berlin of an Oce supported business model should demonstrate that tech is ready for prime time. To make the transition, split runs are normal. Kodak's microzone makes it easier. The Prosper Stream Inkjet is out there.

At any rate, here's what KBA is doing.

Printing Industry News from WhatTheyThink:
KBA web offset users group continues its annual meeting -

"KBA North America, a global press manufacturer based in Dallas, Texas, continued its popular traditional annual meeting of its KBA Web Offset Users Group by utilizing a new webinar format.

More than 40 KBA web offset user members at 14 different print sites participated in the two-day event over a three-hour time period each day in this first-of-its-kind meeting. The KBA Web Offset Users Group is a formally-chartered organization with bylaws, a board of directors, and its own website.
. . .
the goal of the annual meeting is to maintain communication between members and KBA management, look at efficiencies, share opportunities, and provide feedback to sustain member operations. "The main focus, however, is our relationship with KBA," says Letto. "By purchasing a KBA web press, we've undertaken an important partnership with them. We want to fully preserve that two-way conversation."

What a nice, simple idea.

BPO is a good game, until you lose a customer.

2009-11-06T06:53:00.000-05:00

Working at the top of the pyramid is good, but very dangerous.

R.R. Donnelley 3rd Quarter profit drops 92%
- Printing Industry News from WhatTheyThink

"Substantially all of the restructuring and impairment charges in the third quarter of 2009 were associated with the previously reported termination of a significant long-term customer contract in the business process outsourcing reporting unit within the International segment."

Xerox wins Gegenheimer award. Awards are nice. Literacy and selling color cubes is better.

2009-11-06T06:07:00.001-05:00

Xerox wins Gegenheimer award -
Printing Industry News from WhatTheyThink:

"Xerox Corporation has been awarded the 2009 Harold W. Gegenheimer Corporate Award for Industry Service from NPES, The Association for Suppliers of Printing, Publishing and Converting Technologies.

Xerox is the first manufacturer of digital printing equipment to win the award, which recognizes leadership and participation in NPES and industry activities, civic leadership and technical innovation."

One of the partner organizations of NPES is

ProLiteracy Worldwide - an organization sponsoring educational programs and services to empower adults and their families by assisting them to acquire the literacy practices and skills they need to function more effectively.

America is facing an epidemic of high school dropouts. The real problem is that they are adolescent illiterates.

The opportunity for Print is that "readers" are a small but growing niche market. It takes about 150,000 copies sold to get on the NYTimes best seller list. As the globals are searching for "emerging markets" around the globe, they are blind to the emerging market here in the States.

President Obama has made it clear that the reader market will increase. Even if it means the reorganization of High School education.

As the emerging reading market grows in the States, print will grow. Xerox, especially with the power of the Xerox Foundation, can do very well by doing very good in helping to solve this problem and sell lots of color cubes into learning enterprises on the way.