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

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.

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

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

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. "

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.

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

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.

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.

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.

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.

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?

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?

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.

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

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"

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.