Espresso Machine Heats Up
You may have read my earlier post about the beginning of a historical revolution in the printing process revolving around a remarkable wee machine called The Espresso Printing Press.
Today Publisher’s Weekly announced a simply stunning partnership between On Demand Books (owners of The Espresso Printing Press technology) and Lightning Source (the giant print-on-demand company owned by distribution giant Ingram Inc.)
What this partnership means is On Demand Books will have access to data at Lightning Source, allowing Espresso owners to print any book in Lightning Source’s catalogue. Any book. Printed in minutes. For a fraction of the cost of conventionally published books.
Now, agreed you won’t find Espresso machines in your local Starbucks, Chapters or library. At the moment there are only a few in commercial use:
-
University of Alberta Bookstore in Edmonton, Alberta, Canada;
-
the Internet Archive Office in San Francisco, California;
-
the Northshire Bookstore in Manchester, Vermont;
-
the Bibliotheca Alexandrina at Alexandria, Egypt;
-
and there will soon be EBM’s at the New Orleans’ Public Library in New Orleans, Louisiana,
-
The University of Michigan Library in Ann Arbor, Michigan and at
-
DA Information Services in Mitcham, Australia
This news becomes even more remarkable in light of Amazon’s recent move after purchasing the print-on-demand company, BookSurge, requiring their POD publishers to use Amazon’s services or face delisting of their books.
It would appear Amazon, in its blatant attempt at monopoly, is flying in the face of a revolution in publishing that will, eventually, leave them staggering. The Espresso and Lightning Source’s visionary partnership will do everything to energize not only bricks and mortar stores, but libraries and other walk-in business who want to cater to readers, but small publishers and independent authors.