good typography is patriotic
Here is another home-grown degeneracy
White House typography. How can we look ever more silly to authentic culture? Here in Iowa we just finished a new stadium facade with giant stone engraved “HAWKEYES”. But the space between w and k is too wide relative to the closed up aw giving us “HAW KEYS”.
photo merchandise and easel binders
Of course there is a manuscript like niche to print-on-demand. The quickly expanding sector includes
photo merchandise including photo albums and photo calendars. Watch for innovation in easel binders and other tipping and canting book shapes.
“I have written affectionately about the book in The Book on the Bookshelf, but the focus of that essay was how we store books rather than the book itself as a designed object. I have recently been thinking a good deal about the design of the book itself, and I am finding it wanting, especially in its ergonomic features. Hardcover books are heavy and have sharp corners. Their natural configuration appears to be the closed position, and so we have to work to keep them open. Though hardbacks generally look better on the bookshelf, I have come to prefer paperbacks for their lighter weight, softer shape, and greater compliance. This is a subject that I expect to write an essay on shortly.”
Henry Petroski
paper wiki
One option is a build it yourself
service. But why? Because you may need to know what’s different from the changing screen. Think of it as a reference work.
new tagline
Iowa Book Works is now known for its “innovations for book studies programs”.
bourg p.o.d.
“Acme Bookbinding has just installed a new Perfect Binder that is just amazing. Our new Bourg binder is tied directly to a Challenge 3-knife trimmer and this system delivers perfect books, one after another, with virtually no set up from one book size to another.”
“Lightning Source now prints over a million books each month with an average edition size of 1.8.”
The print book now provides a personalized object to match the personalized experience of reading. This paradigm shift reverses the paradigm shift of the advent of printing. Don’t be surprised if your next Amazon order is printed and bound just minutes before it ships.
And, in another artistic achievement,
Keith Smith has just published his 250th in four color copier Lulu.com edition. Hamady may have been the first fine press printer to go to off-set but Keith may be the first edition artist to go from off-set.
the real digital library
While ALA positions its claim to
policy making for the digital library it would be approprate to look at the competition. The most apparent digital library system is Starbucks. Starbucks already operates physical facilities for on-line research equivalent to public library systems and the corporation is investigating the larger role of librarianship as it proposes to bring book retailing into the Starbuck outlets.
The digital library amorphic is just too wide and it can be approached from too many institutional bases. The ALA could be better positioned with claims to the “digital archives” domain. For example, the presidential “libraries” are actually presidential “archives”. They are called libraries just for popular recognition.