Digital BW, The Print

Yes. That is the smartest thing anyone has said around here in a long time Walker.

And it does hurt the entire economy. Obama said it today in his speech at Geogetown Univ. Essentially, we have simply got to go back to making quality things in this world again and stop only rewarding the people who juggle phony numbers at investment institutions. We need both, sure, but what we don't need is 40% of the entire GDP devoted to marketing, investment scams and sales tricks. We are like a bunch of rats in a cage running in circles half the time trying just to keep up with what isn't even important in the firs place.

john





--- In DigitalBlackandWhiteThePrint@yahoogroups.com, BKPhoto@... wrote:
>
> Well said, Walker.
> 
> 
> 
> Bill Kennedy
> 
> 
> -----Original Message-----
> From: Walker Blackwell <forums@...>
> To: DigitalBlackandWhiteThePrint@yahoogroups.com
> Sent: Tue, 14 Apr 2009 3:52 pm
> Subject: Re: [Digital BW] Re: Is this a "conspiracy theory" ?
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
>     
> 
>             
>             
> 
> 
>       
>       
> It's funny how throughout history the only truly massive spurts of  
> 
> innovation came coupled with a culture of openness, sharing, and a  
> 
> general lack of monetary and business thought. Tesla and electricity,  
> 
> the internet, etc.
> 
> 
> 
> If only this was true in the printing world. We would have epson 11880- 
> 
> type heads in Roland-quality printers with ink-systems derived from  
> 
> the medical industry and onboard linux boxes (for the controllers)  
> 
> running open-source but with millions of public dollars going to  
> 
> advanced head technology and LUT tuning.
> 
> 
> 
> Imagine if Epson screening was open-source. Imagine how far that would  
> 
> propel the print industry if we widened the thinking from 20 engineers  
> 
> at Epson Inc. to 20,000.
> 
> 
> 
> Imagine if we had a hardware product like the Eric Blossom's boards  
> 
> for software-defined GNU radio with the HIGHEST quality open source  
> 
> driver in the world that could print any width we built it and take  
> 
> any paper we threw at it. (And imaging if it was a flat-table printer,  
> 
> no paper bending, just suction under the
>  print head.)
> 
> 
> 
> Its time for some brilliant mechanical/robotic engineers to step up  
> 
> and build the starting blocks of such a system. If we did this, the  
> 
> printing world would change for the better and forever. Open source  
> 
> modularized hardware is were we must head. We have been stalled at the  
> 
> margins technically for years (in this country) in a controlled  
> 
> upgrade pattern while big companies with lots of patents suck our  
> 
> wallets dry.
> 
> 
> 
> It started in the 80s with refrigerators and now it's everywhere. All  
> 
> epson has to do each year is add a channel and some nozzles, flip  
> 
> their magenta ink from more-magenta to more-red and back, mess with  
> 
> their cartridge pressure, and call it "technically improved." We all  
> 
> just sprint to get the new printer because our old ones have crappy  
> 
> issues that epson surely new about (3800 rollers, 9600 inkline  
> 
> pressure, o-rings, CF motor errors, vacuum clogs, etc) but decided to  
> 
> only fix one upgrade at a time in order to maximize profit and  
> 
> oversell the public.
> 
> 
> 
> Apple recently TOOK OUT the firewire port from the new MacBooks  
> 
> because they realized you could do Final Cut pro on a cheap MacBook  
> 
> just as well as on the MacBook pros. While this was an obvious thing,  
> 
> the behind the scenes "planned degrading" is much larger. We must  
> 
> break that business cycle. It should be illegal and is hurting our  
> 
> economy. If Cone can re-engineer color ink for
>  epsons with a few  
> 
> chemists and some hutzpa to the point where we don't even need to re- 
> 
> profile our papers, Epson can surely build a printer that does not  
> 
> clog . . . . ever. It's in the hardware. Not the ink.
> 
> 
> 
> Walker
> 
> 
> 
> [Non-text portions of this message have been removed]
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
>  
> 
>     
>   
> 
>     
>     
> 
> 
>     
>     
>     
>     
> 
> 
>     
> 
> 
>     
>     
>     
>     
>     
> 
> 
>  
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> [Non-text portions of this message have been removed]
>