Story for OhmyNews about e-books and the LCC Futures Conference. Running a bit late but links into social networking so counters the idea that only printed books help make new friends.

There are now some clips on YouTube from the LCC Futures Conference. I have started with the eBook as this seems to be a crunch issue for the current situation for print. There is a playlist that includes some presentations from the London Book Fair.



1.Why the eBook will never happen- Chris Linford on barriers around electronics.
2.Ian Lacey explains how the structure in a book supports education.
3.James Fraser celebrates book design but recognises that digital devices are coping with large amounts of text.
From London Book Fair,
5. Sony
7.advice for publishers and
8.some detail on the ePUB format.

It might be better to start with the London Book Fair ones and then look at the problems identified at LCC Futures but this depends on what you have seen already.

Thinking about the LCC Futures conference and the information that the internet is now fourty years old. Chris Linford spoke about personal computers as being not quite fourty years old and claimed that technology innovation usually takes about that long. For example electricity in the home or the motor car. But this cannot be exact. The internet did not seem to be happening much until the early nineties so appearances are not much of a guide.

This would help in my take on IPEX. If it is the Web To Print IPEX, following the Web To Print drupa, then the background of being roughly fourty years into the internet is relevant. Give or take say three percent either way. I may still experiment with fiction and time travel but there is the basis of a theory that may get past the fact checkers.

Yesterday at LCC Futures the Microsoft demo of server streaming used Big Buck Bunny for content. Attribution is all that is asked on creative commons terms. Surely they should mention that Blender is available and that many open source graphics options are on the scene.

Other than that the Silverlight aspects seem to work ok. No sign of Adobe so far but the story is much the same. Convergance of phones and TV sets sometime soon. Video everywhere.

Meanwhile the LCC is being reorganized around "design" and "media" though i don't understand this so far or where "print and publishing" fits in.

More later.

Yesterday Ian Lacey's keynote for the LCC Futures Conference included a showing of this from YouTube-



Is there a continuous community around the LCC / London college of Printing as was? The recent graduates are starting to turn up and describe what they find. Seems a bit different to the classic machine minder. More later. I am in the Elephant shopping centre and have half an hour to find the way out.

Found web access at the elephant. Upstairs ina cash exchamge place.

Adobe still doing press on e-books occasionally http://bit.ly/bnepub

Barnes and Noble promoting ePub and PDF. seems very sensible not to use some strange format that only Barnes and Noble would understand.

I am not expecting anyone from Adobe to be at the LCC Futures Conference. They seem to rely increasingly on web presence and impact in the USA.

The LCC Futures conference is later this week, Wednesday to Friday at the LCC, Elephant and Castle. I have made some notes from previous stories for OhmyNews. It may help to have a bit of perspective. Then a few notes from recently.

Print Morphs Into Communication 2005

John Birkenshaw (PIRA) welcomed print companies who chose descriptions such as "a full service communications consultancy" and saw the future of print as "a software based process."

Marcus Kirby from Vertis PRS mentioned "those horrible spam emails" as the part he liked least.

Adobe, Jutta Koch on what became the PDF Print Engine

Filipa de Chassey from Antenna Audio, wireless Tate Modern

Alan Sekers paid £30,000 in 1984 for a Quantel Paintbox

Adobe Skews Away From Print 2006
Adobe launch Acrobat 8, not much about JDF

Andy Pieroux suggested during the conference that Xerox would no longer use the slogan "The New Business of Printing" but switch to "The News Business of Communication."

Positive Focus promote Jaws PDF Server for knowledge workers

"One take on the Adobe marketing priorities is that print as a prospect has more or less disappeared."

London College Mixes Communication and Print 2007
Ian Lacey claims that e-learning has not been a success as hoped for.

Chris Linford spoke on problems of web copyright for creatives

Colleen Murrell from Deakin University on video journalism and iTunes University also Alan Greenberg from Apple

Martin Brown from Asset TV on a web channel

Web features in presentations from recent graduates

Show daily printed short run by Canon

LCC Conference Considers the Inevitability of the E-Book 2008

Ian Lacey claimed that the printed book is "the last bastion of defence against hyperlinking."

Heidelberg demonstrate Anicolor

OhmyNews editors reverse my headline and sub headline-

"Heidelberg presents offset litho as digital workflow"

Background on ePUB

"Litho has improved, but these are marginal and incremental gains. In digital printing there are going to be step changes. " Robert Stabler, HP UK

Recently Adobe MAX had very little I noticed that was not about Flash, but I found one presentation about ePUB through a blog.

e-learning is still doing ok, I think. Almost not mentioned as a web aspect for learning is normal.

ipex5 lcc shows print as part of communication

sometime around 2010 it will become clear why the LCC is not called the LC Print.

IPEX could be a time to write about this again

to be amended

IPEX4 inkjet targets runs of 2000

Will wait on guidance from other blogs such as Andy Tribute

There will be a result out of actual working machines. My guess is that 2000 will be the run claimed by inkjet so the litho response will be interesting.

to be amended

ipex3 premedia redefined by journalists

Checking out premedia section to study what the word means. Can text be published directly to web and devices as well as a print workflow?

Could start with looking at Haymarket and Guardian group as publishers. There is a mismatch sometimes between what they write and what they are doing. Guardian writes not much on print technology, as if it has always been there and nothing much happens. But they did spend £500m on manroland kit. Not many UK orders in 2010?

to be amended

ipex2-Adobe not really there

Guess is that #Adobe will not have a stand/booth but will just show through PDF Print Engine OEMs. Implication that Adobe Classic is over as a marketing message. Based on impression of Print09Chicago.

To be amended.

IPEX#1 Heidelberg litho for short runs

Draft first story from IPEX 2010, also a test of time travel.

Early press conference will cover comparison with digital, such as inkjet.

See previous story from Total Print Expo 2008

To be amended later.

Here is a link to a video from What They Think.

Fuji was close to the Heidelberg stand at Total Print Expo last year in London.

Main points

The official launch is still intended for IPEX. That is an actual device, not a "cyber joke".

Runlength up to 2,500 . Litho will have to show some comparison.

Impression of Print09 in Chicago continues to suggest that time travel is unavoidable. Reality of Chicago now compared to claims for IPEX 2010 suggests much scope for disruption. Sometime soon.

Through Neil Stratton on LinkedIn comes this quote from an editorial in Deutscher Drucker ( not sure where the translation happened)

These days when trade shows are held all those taking part are looking for clues about the future economic situation—and the printing industry is no exception. One of our industry’s largest shows of the year, Print 09 in Chicago, has therefore come under sharpened scrutiny.
That the stands sizes and the once over-elaborate structures were substantially cut back one might take as a positive sign of a return to normality; but the fact that many companies completely reinterpreted the term ‘exhibitor’ and simply didn’t show products at all is something that the visitors can hardly welcome. To some extent these exhibits were replaced by little ‘cyber jokes’ to be viewed on oversized touchscreens. But is that enough to make a print manager get in his or her car and drive several hundred kilometres to a show?

One thing is clear, when firms such as Manroland or Kodak no longer show systems, it forces not just the show organizers but also all the other exhibitors to rethink. Or, in other words, how little can one present on the stand without disappointing the visitors and customers? After all, it was a survey by the Print 09 organizers themselves that revealed before the show that visitors were very keen to see machines and systems. At the same time, they also expected to use it as an opportunity to discuss innovative applications and lucrative areas of business

So far as visitor figures go, there were unfortunately no positive signals from Print 09. Whilst the largest Chinese print show, China Print in Beijing a few months back, left one in no doubt that the Chinese print industry had pulled itself together, the empty halls in Chicago made it clear that the US market continues to be in deep crisis.

Thing is, the "cyber jokes" can be done online. They have already started. Actual kit working in real time still crucial for a decent loop of online and Birmingham UK.

Found this through Twitter from MarkzwareTV. I thought my own videos were shaky. Someone should give away external microphones on the way in to IPEX.....

Is print now part of communication?

This note is intended for the IP3 website (Institute of Paper, Printing and Publishing) . It may be an article or more like a blog post if other people add to it. It is mostly opinion but starts from some facts.

The London College of Communication will host a Futures Conference on October Wednesday 21st - Friday 23rd. Previously this was located in Earls Court as part of Total Print Expo but this show has been cancelled for 2009. The change of scope to include litho in Digital Print World was not enough to expand a base. The Futures Conference has had a different direction, taking digital to include the Web and new media.

I have written reports on previous conferences for OhmyNews, a news website in Korea. Last year they switched my headlines so the talk at the conference about e-books became the main story and the subheading was about Heidelberg demonstrating litho for runs under 50. It turns out the editors may have had a case for doing this. Including the content on mobile phones there has been increasing interest in e-books and devices. I usually include opinion from people I meet about the name change from London College of Printing to LC Communication. Hardly anyone supports this as LCP is still widely known and the Communication word has not really been promoted or explored.

IPEX recently announced that John Warnock and Chuck Geschke from Adobe are to be Champions of Print for IPEX 2010. IPEX has effectively already started in terms of presence on Twitter and general promotion. However as far as I can make out there was not much Adobe presence at Print09 in Chicago. They definitely did not attend Total Print Expo in 2008 and Apple decided not to buy space at drupa. Computer companies have a radical view on the speed of change and what is worth advertising. The recent Adobe press releases are mostly about Flash and video.

My guess is that the products regarded as Adobe Classic - Postscript and PDF - are regarded as mature and Macromedia is effectively repositioned as Adobe(FLSH). This may be just some strange behaviour that the UK can ignore or it may anticipate some disruption that will be evident fairly soon. By next May there could be some significant changes. At IPEX there is a category of "pre-media" but not much clarity on what this means.

Many e-books are in the EPUB format, based on XML. The speed and flexibility of the Web means that publishing can be interactive. So far the Job Definition Format (JDF) has not been promoted as a way for print customers to specify requirements. Web to Print appears to be just another browser screen but XML for hard copy is a topic to explore if print continues as part of a publishing mix.

IPEX will continue on a large scale, partly because of the global audience. Annual events such as Total Print Expo may give a better indication of what is happening in the UK, even when postponed. The Futures Conference will discuss most related issues and it may soon be time for acceptance of the word "communication", something print is part of. It will be also be interesting if details are public on how the courses are arranged around media, design and publishing.

The Elephant and Castle is not a hard place to find, but for people who cannot be there some online social networking could start soon and then continue through October. My own Twitter tag is #will789gb.

Found this looking for PDF-A ahead of the meeting at Print09 tomorrow. Seems to be the main event for PDF.

My sense of time is getting more vague. IPEX have announced that John Warnock and Chuck Geschke are the latest Champions in Print. Will they be there in May? If not at least there can be some blog links. Can't remember anyone from Adobe being in the Printweek 100 ever. But can remember loads of stories about various issues that would result in PDf never being implemented quite as claimed. So this blog is right to continue as being in 2002, a time when a bit of cred for PDF would have been an extra.

Continues on the blog for drupa 2008, just a bit closer to real time.

Please add comment if you remember Adobe UK in the Printweek 100. Rough dates would also be interesting.

This is another time travel post. Subject to revision obviously. But as of today I am working on the assumption that Adobe Classic , Postscript and PDF, has more or less gone, traded in for Macromedia or Adobe(FLSH). Print 09 has started and a Google News search finds that What They Think reports that Kodak include the PDF Print Engine in Prinergy Workflow 5.1. So it is for the equipment stands to show what PDF offers. I cannot find that there is an Adobe stand.

Meanwhile there is a press release for Adobe Story, a new script support launched at IBC in Amsterdam. More like the Flash future.

As suggested previously, if Adobe Classic is not worth promoting then the margins may be about to find a new level.

If someone reading this is in Chicago and finds an Adobe stand please add a comment. Obviously I am just guessing from a distance.

Stories intended for OhmyNews about Technology events mostly in the UK

Previous stories for OhmyNews have covered trade fairs etc in the UK with some reference through web links to other events. IPEX 2010 has already started as promoted so this list covers other events ahead of this. Most of the technology seems fairly stable now. I do not expect many surprises in the next nine months. The issues are about how the potential is implemented.

Print 09 Chicago

11-16 Sept

Stories could be similar to those expected for IPEX-

Heidelberg claims short runs for litho (see Total Print Expo last year)

Adobe lost in Macromedia (Postscript has vanished, concentrate on Flash)

Pre-media to scope e-books, video

"This is a web-to-print event" - Zipper


IP Expo
7-8 Oct

Includes cloud and mobile

XML possible, ahead of Online Informationm / IMS, see below


Adobe MAX

4-7 Oct

Adobe event, USA only in real time. Mostly Flash, I guess.

The Frankfurt Book Fair now includes a tech aspect

14-18 Oct

Tools of Change one day version

13th

Also White Space from Bernd Zipper so could relate to drupa

The white space / weiss-raum blog

Expect more tech developments around e-books

Scribd ok? London publishers could still ignore it but they would be wrong

Inkjet for short run books. (could be at a print show)
-------------------

London College of Communication Futures Conference

Total Print Expo has folded this year butsomething will happen at LCC

some time in October

Can i write another story for Ohmynews about the change from Print to communications? needs some better info on the changes in LCC structure.


---------------------------
Online Information / IMS
1-3 Dec

XML at the back as IMS. EPUB format for e-books, JDF for hard copy.
No sign of PDFXML or Adobe.
-------------------------
BETT

13 -18 Jan 2010

Netbooks, compare with phones. Operating Systems.
----------------------

Learning technologies

27-28 Jan

Adobe appearance at an adult show
----------------------

Book Fair arrives in London

19-21 Apr

Scribd ok? Yes, i think by then it should be possible to sell from UK.
If not, special lobby if they have a stand.

-----------------

IPEX

www.ipex.org

18-25 May

Stories see above, Chicago.