Software - Web-to-print

Where does a 400-lb. gorilla sit? In this era of mega-mergers and high-flying Internet stock valuations, we are hearing some very large numbers. But most of these numbers seem like abstractions. There is the common-sense part of our minds that rebels at multibillion-dollar market valuations of cyber companies with paltry physical assets and no profits whatsoever. Sure the numbers are big, but they seem as relevant to our day-to-day world of laying ink down on paper as those astronomers use to tell us the number of light years to some distant star. But GM—the heavy steel, huge factory and honest-to-goodness tangible antithesis of the cyber

The robotic scanner of yesteryear is long gone. Today's higher optical resolutions, advanced color user interfaces, fully integrated ICC-compatible software and faster scanning speeds are helping the prepress workflow scream. BY MARIE RANOIA ALONSO Does it seem like the scanning market is standing in the conservative corner of digital prepress? Sure, glamorous, big-name PDF workflows are topics of industry discussion and intrinsic analysis, digital halftone proofing and digital platesetting devices duke it out for the time, attention and dollars of prepress executives and print production professionals—but what about the scanning market? Does anything scan-dalous ever happen to these image manipulators? As of

BOSTON—As the new year began, the war of words between Waltham, MA-based Harlequin and Foster City, CA-based Electronics for Imaging (EFI), heated up. On the same day that Harlequin filed a lawsuit in United States District Court here claiming that EFI has violated a federal law that governs false advertising, the U.S. District Court in San Francisco ruled in EFI's favor in its patent infringement lawsuit against Harlequin. The San Francisco court ruled for EFI on all 17 issues raised by Harlequin. EFI officials say the San Francisco court's rulings pave the way for EFI to fully press its infringement case against Harlequin.

Remember when Macs started shipping with nine-gig drives? Although that seemed like a lot of storage space at the time, it sure didn't take long before it was filled to the brim. Today, most printers and prepress shops now use client-server configurations with RAIDS attached to servers to store clients' files, along with a variety of tape and other backup/archival systems. Yet, no matter how big the drive, one thing seems constant: You can never have too much storage capacity. And although drives continue to get cheaper, managing data storage is one of those headaches that never seems to go away. Until now, maybe. The latest

In the June 1999 issue of Printing Impressions, an editorial by Editor-in-Chief Mark Michelson notes that he is "more convinced than ever that print will not only be alive, but will prosper, in the next millennium and beyond." While he concedes that "printing production will continue to evolve" and that "some product niches will be forever lost to electronic information dissemination," print will remain strong "because no other medium is as portable, flexible and widely accessible." Editorials like these have been appearing amidst news reports that sales and profit numbers for most printers and publishers continue to be healthy. It's no longer fashionable to

Internet companies are changing print buyer to printer (and printer to printer) interaction. Beyond e-procurement and equipment auctions, the Internet is targeting the very core of the printing industry—the printing community itself. BY MARIE RANOIA ALONSO John Cooley Jr., vice president of sales at his family's business, Philadelphia-based, $25 million Innovation Printing & Litho, does not oversee a company the size and scope of R.R. Donnelley & Sons. Cooley does not buy consumables with the same purchase power as do print consolidators the likes of Nationwide Graphics. Cooley does not push Innovation Printing, founded by Cooley's father, to compete against the billion dollar

Is a digital proofer on your shopping list? Which digital proofing devices will you buy this year? What will be the improved range of spot colors accurately produced by these devices? Who's talking stochastic? Find out—today. BY MARIE RANOIA ALONSO Happy new year. Need a new digital proofer? What an interesting time to shop for proofing expertise. (Sorry. No after-Christmas clearance on these items!) Expanding color gamuts, open front ends, new media selections, pigment-based inks, digital halftone and ink-jet devices, multi-setting proofers, spot color surprises—it seems every flavor of digital proofer is pushing to better mimic press conditions, deliver stable, accurate color and provide

Well, now that we've gotten over the millennium bug, or at least the hangover that accompanies the usual New Year's Eve festivities, we can hopefully focus our attention on the coming year. What will the new year/decade/century/millennium bring? Probably a lot of the same headaches the preceding one(s) bestowed upon us. That is, we can still expect to receive files that are missing fonts, images and other elements that are necessary to print. Of course, pricing and turnaround will continue to be the two legs of the stool expected to flex, while demands on quality remain as rigid as ever. Last year was

The Internet's rapid adoption as a vehicle for business communication broke new ground in '99 with the emergence of a variety of e-commerce services targeting commercial printers. With 2000 in sight, it is imperative to know the Internet players that want to know YOU. BY MARIE RANOIA ALONSO Interested in using the Internet for winning print bids and for collaborative discussions with print buyers? Curious about using the Web to get the best prices on paper, or to take part in an equipment auction? If so, there are suddenly, it seems, an aggressive variety of e-commerce companies positioning to be the shopping platform of

If I asked you "Is printing a product or a service?" I'd likely get a variety of answers, such as "Product," "Service," "Yes and No," "Both" and "In some cases . . . " Does it make any difference? Yes. It's the business "model" for our printing companies. The difference is the intensity of relationship to the customer, isn't it? Marketing, we often say, is finding and filling a need. What's the "need" we're filling? Is it for a "shelf" item—a product—a commodity? Then the customer relationship is impersonal. If it's for a "service," then it's personal, up close. In most commercial printing, there's