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The BookMachine: On-Demand Book Printing in 3-5 Minutes
Photo_Designer writes "Engadget has an article about these cool BookMachines that spit out on-demand books in just a few minutes. Sounds cool. Forget eBooks.. get the real thing!" The company website has some more information, though it's a bit suspiciously skimpy on hard specifications.
In USia, however, it's a different story. IMHO, there's a perverse sense of pride in not reading that is slowly crawling through the USian population. More and more people (that I work with, at least) simply want to go home and let the TV do their imagining for them.
So, you could have vending machines which not only print books, but tuck the reader in to bed after bringing them hot coco and a stuffed bear before reading it to them and they still wouldn't take off.
However, for you and I of the dwindling reading population, it is a neat thing.
Nobody reads anymore, huh? So all these giant Barnes and Nobles they're building are just for decoration?
I knew it all along! Now, excuse me, a Simpson's rerun is on and I need it to think for me.
O come on. The technology has been around for (many) years for similar things to allow "out of print" cds to be produced for people interested in music beyond the top 40 pop charts, and I have yet to see it in stores.
If the music industry couldn't get their act together to allow on the spot pressing / burning of their back catalogue it's a pipe dream to hope for this in books.
"And we have seen and do testify that the Father sent the Son to be the Savior of the World" 1 John 4:14
Library checked out of the book you need for that paper? Just make a copy!
The music store out of the CD you want? Just make a copy!
Someone still has to pay the publisher per copy for works under copyright protection, not to mention for the paper. Don't expect libraries to become retail centers.
KFG
Barnes and Nobles are, in fact, realyl just a starbucks wrapper. they add to the atmosphere starbucks is trying to provide. at least that is the best estimation i can come up with..
The Neo-Bohemian Techno-Socialist
This is a tremendous opportunity for the publishing industry. They can save boffo $$$ on printing, shipping, warehousing, and other costs. There will be no shipping and they will only print what they sell. ( good for the environment too ) The customer will be happy in being able to get any book s/he wants at any bookstore that has one of these machines. It will be interesting to see if the publishing industry will be as short sighted as the RIAA in whether or not they will run with this new technology.
Why invest large amounts of money into a medium that is slowly shrinking. Children don't read anymore and more and more people are moving their periodicals to an electronic format. E-ink makes it so paper is no longer needed and OLED's promise an even cheaper alternative. I remember when Jeff Bezos at a company meeting (Amazon, duh) said 'Books aren't going anywhere because people like the feel of a dead tree in their heands". But this is slowly changing. Magazine and newspapers sales continue to shrink, book sales are constantly going down. Libraries are getting less and less funding every year (thanks Bush) and fewer people are reading things that aren't on the internet.
I remember a time when we all got the paper for our news. Now we just logon to Slashdot, newsforge, Salon and others to get our daily fix. Why do I need paper at all?
I give it another 10 years til paper books and periodicals becomes a niche market... at best.
This is my sig. There are many like it but this one is mine.
Imagine doing research or a book report and having to cite your sources. Do you cite that it was published a couple of days ago at the back of someone's tour bus? No, that's just the printing location. Publication is the FIRST printing. But if the first printing was indeed in the back of a tour bus, then yes, that's where it was published. But interestingly, the machine COULD put the exact printing date and time on the copyright page (the appropriate page for such info) along with the location in both text and latitude/longitude, along with the printing number of the book, and not just "third printing" but presuming it's networked (and why would it NOT be in this day and age?) it could authoritatively say "This is the 47,513rd printed copy of this book."
Tag lost or not installed.
Oh come on.
The reason the library only has one copy of the book is because it gets used very rarely [or lack of funds, but probably not applicable in the case of a library that'll have a hightech book-printing-machine-o-matic]. Just what are you going to do with all that paper used to bind and print the book once you're done writing, throw it away?
Why not charge you for a text PDF, since the machine would need a copy of the text anyway? It's unlikely that you need an ENTIRE book to write a paper. You likely need a few sentences or a chapter.
It only implies the desire to possess. It does not even imply the intent to read.
Oh, sure, if you or I buy a book it at least implies the intent (although still not the actual reading), but you and I are not the general case.
KFG
I think this should be part of copyright reform, if you let a piece fall out of print then you lose copyright to it. The technology is here to provide for printing at zero marginal cost to the publisher so there is no excuse for them to not allow continuous printing after the main print run(s) have sold out.
There are 4 boxes to use in the defense of liberty: soap, ballot, jury, ammo. Use in that order. Starting now.
Or I don't see why they could not stick one in the library and let them sell it to you for a few dollars. I know I'd use it. But then again I give money to "friends of the library" already. I would have no problems with this whatsoever.
Cypherpunks: Civil Liberty Through Complex Mathematics. Those who live by the sword die by the arrow.
Of course you don't, because you read books. That's what books are for, right? Like plates are made for eating off of, thimbles are made for sewing with and action figures are made for playing with.
A goodly number of people buy a goodly number of books with absolutely no intent to read them, ever. They go on display on the shelves right next to the plates that no one had better ever eat off of, the thimbles that will never be used for sewing, the model cars that will never pushed around while making "Vroom, vroom" noises and the action figures that any child who actual plays with them will likely get a punishment for doing so.
Entire companies exist, profitably, for selling nothing but plates that will never be eaten off of. People are funny.
Then there are the even larger number of books sold where at the time of purchase the intent to read them was at least present, but the attempt is never actually made, because reading does not have a high enough priority in their lives to support that intent. The fact that they rarely actually even attempt to read a book rarely disuades them from purchasing more and more books that they have "good intentions" about, but never actually read.
I do not, personally, understand this behavior, but I certainly observe a good deal of it.
KFG
Inkling Books
Second, the company behind this, On Demand Machine, is the SCO of publishing. They've never managed to create a commercially competitive product. But like SCO, they're attempting to exploit the current mess in IP law to enrich themselves at the expense of those who have created a different and more successful business model (placing far more complex POD systems in wholesale book channels). Think Linux for their competitors. On Demand Machine has a badly worded patent on a kiosk-based, book-at-a-time scheme that they've never managed to make viable. Now they've managed to dupe a jury into accepting that their patent applies to the very different business model used by LightningSource/Ingram/Amazon.
On Demand Machine is currently going after the big guys (Ingram/Amazon). But if they win there, they'll have lots of money to sue mom-and-pop print shops and those who have developed online file to book print systems, including those using free/open source software and public domain etexts.
Fortunately, there's a lot of prior art for print-on-demand from the late 1980s that could invalidate their now-dangerous patent. If anyone has legally sound evidence that illustrates books being printed one-at-a-time after being ordered from before the early 1990s, please get in touch with me via the InklingBooks.com link above. I'll help to put you in touch with the good-guy lawyers in the lawsuit. Interestingly, as with SCO's attack on Linux, in this case IBM is among the good guys.Unfortunately, the case is not being fought with IBM's lawyers.
--Mike Perry, Inkling Books, Seattle
From the most recent issue of Newsweek: from '93-'03 there was a "58%increase in titles published" From '92-'02 there was a "12% decrease in fiction readers" So that giant Barnes and Noble exists because there are more books bieng printed each year than ever before. Unfortunately, fewer people are reading them.
How'd you conclude that? More books published + Fewer fiction readers implies MORE NON-FICTION, not fewer readers.
This is true. It would be very nice if all publishers were willing to offer their catalog titles (those out of print anyways) as print-on-demand books. Record companies should really do the same for CDs as well. I don't know why they both don't, it's just one more way to earn more money and at least as importantly, to please their customers.
I work for an "On demand printing company" the "on demand" part has been a printing industry buzz word for a LONG time. We (the company I work for) are in the "On Demand" printing biz... but we actually make a profit! This is a cut-throat business, I see printshops (digital only) struggling just like the offset-only printshops.
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Don't believe the buzzword hype!
I am amazed this was posted as a "news story", but I know the horse-like blinders with some of the news posts here.
Also, shouts-out to my fellow Sweat Hogs back at the shop. And of course many thanks to the developers of GhostScript--sweet!
My Simpsons style picture of a chalkboard on the wall next to my desk says it all:
"I do not work in a sweat shop."
"I do not work in a sweat shop."
"I do not work in a sweat shop."
-signed Anonymous SysAdmin/CopyWhore in SoCal
you're reading. the claims that folks aren't reading any more are highly exaggerated. people may be reading different things than they did when there was nothing but novels, magazines, and newspapers. granted, Tivo and DVD makes it easier to watch TV (since there's usually something decent available to watch). But the big change IMO is the availability of online reading resources. I don't watch that much streaming video and I spend a lot of time online, and that time is primarily spent reading.
Novels are for sunday afternoons at the beach where the sand would otherwise get into my wifi-enabled gear. Newspapers? ((insert gratuitous slap at the NYT here))