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www.us-tech.com


Tech-Op-ed June, 2017 SOUNDING OFF


By Walter Salm Editor Emeritus


Far from Dead, Print Resurges


I


love my Nook Book e-reader, even with its annoying quirks. At any time that I am reading electronically stored material, I am also reading two oth- er books in hard copy. Of those books, a recent paperback read had a very


special characteristic: it cost me absolutely nothing. Print periodicals and newspapers are another matter. A huge number of


them have folded, succumbing to the tsunami of competition from instant news, blogs and social media. There are many people who still like the look and feel of hard copy, myself included, along with the many readers of the print edition of U.S. Tech. When I first started to work in the publishing industry, we were still us-


ing hot lead for typesetting. Lines of type were molded into a lead slug on a monstrous, exceedingly complex Linotype machine. Most U.S. Tech readers have probably never even seen one. This machine had been first developed by Otto Merganthaler in 1884, and became the de rigueur method of typesetting until the 1970s-80s, when the job was taken over by a number of different “cold composition” technologies. This hot lead typesetting technology had re- mained basically unchanged for nearly 100 years. The Linotype revolutionized typesetting. Until its introduction, type was


hand-set using individual letters of type, just as Johannes Gutenberg had done in 1439, with his revolutionary system of printing with movable, reusable type, inked and pressed onto paper on a printing press. This technique involves pick- ing out individual letters from a compartmented tray, which later came to be known as a California type case, and in later days, without the type, became a sought-after collector’s item, used for displaying tiny memorabilia. Reusable type meant that a print shop was limited in the number of pages it could print in a daily newspaper, for example, since there was a finite amount of type in in- ventory in the print shop that could be used each day. It would then be washed and resorted into the California cases, all by


hand. It was done this way for more than 400 years. The Linotype meant that daily papers were no longer limited to just 8 pages; there was now an infinite amount of type available, as long as the supply of lead ingots didn’t run out. Pages of documents could be saved for reprinting (as in books), with revisions and corrections made between editions and new, additional print runs. The Linotype machine used brass molds or matrices which would drop


from a font magazine in response to keyboard strokes. The keyboard bore no resemblance to a typewriter; there were many, many more keys, laid out in the same locations as letters in the California type case, making the transi- tion easier for typesetters first learning to use the Linotype. When a line was full, the operator would press a hefty lever next to the keyboard instead of a carriage return; the matrices were automatically transported to the molding station, where molten lead would be pressed into place. When the line of type had been cast and cooled enough to be solidified, it would be ejected onto a composer’s stick. When the stick was full, the operator would manually re- move it. After each line was cast, the row of brass matrix molds would be picked up by a mechanical arm and raised to the top of the font case. A unique digital-like keying system cut into a V-shaped staircase pattern on one end of each matrix guided their return to the proper slot in the font case. Everything worked by gravity feed. As a boy, I would prowl my hometown newspaper offices, standing out of


everyone’s way, mesmerized by the banks of Linotype machines, listening to the almost musical clink-clink-clink of brass matrices dropping down the chute from the font case, and basking in the glow of heat from their molten lead pots. Today’s presses use a much more sophisticated print technology, with far


fewer steps at the printing plant. Our art director sends digital files to the printing plant where publishing software prepares plates for a high-speed five-color press. Today anyone with the right computer software can become an instant publisher, taking all the mystery out of it. Yes, print is still alive and well, and new books are being printed on an incredible scale. There are still people out there — myself included — who like the look and feel of a real book and/or newspaper or magazine. And if you’re reading this in the hard copy version of U.S. Tech, you know exactly what I’m talking about. r


PUBLISHER’S NOTE


By Jacob Fattal Publisher


Augmented Reality: More Real or Less?


to the physical world. This can be as simple as a smart mirror that displays the time and


N


weather forecast for the day, or as complex as an interactive 3D model of a pa- tient’s internal organs while a surgeon performs a keyhole operation. Already, we’re seeing common applications of AR in advertising, where hovering over an image with a smartphone camera causes animations to play on its surface, or objects to pop out at the viewer. At Facebook’s recent developers’ conference, CEO Mark Zuckerberg out-


lined his company’s plans for the future of AR. In his view, photo and video are becoming much more central to our communication with one another than text. Therefore, he reasons that camera technology will become more central to how we share information in the future. Facebook’s project currently focus- es on using AR to overlay digital information into the physical world through its range of smartphone apps. But, once the problem of integrating this tech- nology into a practical and comfortable heads-up display is solved, augment- ed reality may do away with the smartphone altogether. This type of hands-free digital information has endless applications for


industry, health care and the military. LA-based AR company Daqri has de- veloped a construction helmet that uses its built-in safety visor as a display. The helmet can, for example, show the interior of a structure to a worker on the outside. Military aircraft have been using heads-up displays for years, in the form of transparent screens that allow the pilot to gather information without looking away from his or her target. At NEPCON China, in April, we were treated to a demonstration of


ASM’s new smart glasses, which connect the wearer to the company’s service and support network, offering remote solutions to technical problems in real time. At ASM’s factory in Munich, the company uses digital displays on work surfaces to guide workers through cable harness assembly steps. Some people will certainly resist the adoption of AR. There are enormous


privacy concerns that come along with being visually connected to the Inter- net and the Cloud at every moment. Some will be unhappy that we may no longer require physical objects like TVs, computer screens and handheld phones. The question is: With AR, is the world more real or less? r


ot confined to chunky headsets with thick cable tethers like its kissing cousin virtual reality (VR), augmented reality (AR) uses a variety of everyday objects, devices and surfaces to project digital information in-


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