Welcome to Printing Industry News Digest (PIND) issue 93, providing a summary of major news items from the printing, publishing, packaging, digital, and communications technology sectors. PIND incorporates brief summaries and links to the week's key news stories so that you can look up that all important detail, digging deeper behind the headline. Do also take a look at our automated Twitter-based GenesisNews #Print Daily publication; why not take out a free subscription for a daily digital delivery!
Further to last week’s HP Indigo headline, a number of other runners-and-riders in the B2 digital stakes have emerged with new product as Drupa gets ever closer. The French digital equipment manufacturer MGI announced details of its AlphaJet B2 sheetfed inkjet – a machine that will make its official debut at the show. Meanwhile Xeikon, already in the B2 sector for a number of years, though with a web fed architecture, has enhanced its offering with details of a new toner product.
In Germany, sporting a web width of 782mm, the newly announced RotaJet from KBA was unveiled, and is bound to turn a few heads. Equipped with inkjet heads from Kyocera, the four-back-four web perfector will image up to 150 metres per minute. Whilst the product is in its infancy, an inkjet design built on KBA’s web press experience makes an awful lot of sense.
Still in the digital world, more detail has emerged this week regarding Kodak and its slide into Chapter 11.
Whilst presses may be getting ever more “digital” in terms of imaging technology, the bigger question of whether the buying public wants paper based or digitally stored publications, and this is the subject of a feature from Print Media Centr.
Whichever final distribution vehicle suits your publication, Photoshop is likely to play some part in the creation process. News was released this week of the release of Photoshop CS6 Beta available as a free download. Worth a look.
In the tablet world, one very interesting feature from Wired focuses on the subject of what Google might do to its Android OS to keep products based on it a viable alternative to the ever popular iPad.
No surprises that price is highlighted as a key component of the above feature, and this is illustrated perfectly by the UK availability of the sub-£100 Storage Options Scroll Excel tablet at PC World. We mentioned this very affordable 7-inch Android 2.3 tablet in a recent edition of PIND, and whilst it does not boast the greatest of specs, it does have some interesting features, and a price that is sure to attract.
At the other end of the spectrum – in both price and spec terms – we find the AT200 from Toshiba. An impressively thin and light piece of 10.1 inch tablet kit, is it going to attract a huge audience at £399 / $530? That’s surely into iPad territory, and at PIND we know where our money would go given the choice.
Talking of Apple, there was an interesting slant this week from Mark Ritson writing for Marketing Week. The title: “Apple stands on the edge of a parent trap” probably leads you into Mark’s subject matter quite well. I am not 100% convinced. My teenage daughter has coveted the iPhone ever since one entered our house. Come upgrade time, she readily grabbed my 3G product as her own, and has since moved up through the ranks to the 4 and 4S. Price is the major factor why teens select Android, and that has to be coupled with the cost involved in having an Apple product stolen. The product is still coveted by teenagers in the UK.
Always struggling to find those elusive umlauts or quirky symbols? Well here is the site for you. It claims to put those hard to find characters just one click away. Sounds good to us! Mind you, it’s easier to find many of these characters on an iPad keyboard: this CNet video helps to explain, but many addition accented characters can be obtained by simply holding your finger on the on-screen keyboard’s character. Try it when in symbol mode and further extended characters become available. Press and hold the £ for example and a wide range of currency symbols are yours to select from!
Finally, do keep checking back to see what will be featured in our next edition, PIND 94. For an RSS feed of PIND, copy this link into your feed reader; and click here for the GenesisNews #Print Daily – you can even take out a free subscription for this daily news update on print, publishing, packaging and associated technology!
PIND093
Missed Issue 92, including HP’s B2 digital press? Then simply click here!
Issue 91: print v. e-books debate
Issue 90: UK exhibition focus, publishing news
Issue 89: Print is Dead! discussion
Follow @GenesisNews on Twitter for regular updates.
Got friends that might like GenesisNews? Tweet them now: click here!
Further to last week’s HP Indigo headline, a number of other runners-and-riders in the B2 digital stakes have emerged with new product as Drupa gets ever closer. The French digital equipment manufacturer MGI announced details of its AlphaJet B2 sheetfed inkjet – a machine that will make its official debut at the show. Meanwhile Xeikon, already in the B2 sector for a number of years, though with a web fed architecture, has enhanced its offering with details of a new toner product.In Germany, sporting a web width of 782mm, the newly announced RotaJet from KBA was unveiled, and is bound to turn a few heads. Equipped with inkjet heads from Kyocera, the four-back-four web perfector will image up to 150 metres per minute. Whilst the product is in its infancy, an inkjet design built on KBA’s web press experience makes an awful lot of sense.
Still in the digital world, more detail has emerged this week regarding Kodak and its slide into Chapter 11.Whilst presses may be getting ever more “digital” in terms of imaging technology, the bigger question of whether the buying public wants paper based or digitally stored publications, and this is the subject of a feature from Print Media Centr.
Whichever final distribution vehicle suits your publication, Photoshop is likely to play some part in the creation process. News was released this week of the release of Photoshop CS6 Beta available as a free download. Worth a look.In the tablet world, one very interesting feature from Wired focuses on the subject of what Google might do to its Android OS to keep products based on it a viable alternative to the ever popular iPad.
No surprises that price is highlighted as a key component of the above feature, and this is illustrated perfectly by the UK availability of the sub-£100 Storage Options Scroll Excel tablet at PC World. We mentioned this very affordable 7-inch Android 2.3 tablet in a recent edition of PIND, and whilst it does not boast the greatest of specs, it does have some interesting features, and a price that is sure to attract.At the other end of the spectrum – in both price and spec terms – we find the AT200 from Toshiba. An impressively thin and light piece of 10.1 inch tablet kit, is it going to attract a huge audience at £399 / $530? That’s surely into iPad territory, and at PIND we know where our money would go given the choice.
Talking of Apple, there was an interesting slant this week from Mark Ritson writing for Marketing Week. The title: “Apple stands on the edge of a parent trap” probably leads you into Mark’s subject matter quite well. I am not 100% convinced. My teenage daughter has coveted the iPhone ever since one entered our house. Come upgrade time, she readily grabbed my 3G product as her own, and has since moved up through the ranks to the 4 and 4S. Price is the major factor why teens select Android, and that has to be coupled with the cost involved in having an Apple product stolen. The product is still coveted by teenagers in the UK.Always struggling to find those elusive umlauts or quirky symbols? Well here is the site for you. It claims to put those hard to find characters just one click away. Sounds good to us! Mind you, it’s easier to find many of these characters on an iPad keyboard: this CNet video helps to explain, but many addition accented characters can be obtained by simply holding your finger on the on-screen keyboard’s character. Try it when in symbol mode and further extended characters become available. Press and hold the £ for example and a wide range of currency symbols are yours to select from!
Finally, do keep checking back to see what will be featured in our next edition, PIND 94. For an RSS feed of PIND, copy this link into your feed reader; and click here for the GenesisNews #Print Daily – you can even take out a free subscription for this daily news update on print, publishing, packaging and associated technology!
PIND093
Missed Issue 92, including HP’s B2 digital press? Then simply click here!
Issue 91: print v. e-books debate
Issue 90: UK exhibition focus, publishing news
Issue 89: Print is Dead! discussion
Follow @GenesisNews on Twitter for regular updates.
Got friends that might like GenesisNews? Tweet them now: click here!
