Reading about Gutenberg, movable type, and printing in general always makes me think about just how far we’ve come in the realm of communications and the ability to disseminate information. As many of you know, I’m a letterpress printer, using machines that aren’t much different from the ones Gutenberg himself worked with five hundred, yep, that’s 500! years ago!!!

On the other end of spectrum, though, is the work that I’m lucky enough to do every day in the realm of electronic communications. Read the Wired, This Day In Tech, article, and allow your mind to wander, thinking about, imagining, the world of lead type, and heavy cast iron that was needed to get a message out there. Then think back a bit further to a time of hand scribes, and no dissemination at all except what could be passed word-of-mouth.

It’s kind of hard to imagine especially in a world rapid-fire tweets, Facebook status updates, RSS feeds, and blog posts just like this one, that not too long ago there was no Web, or iPhone, or Blackberry or anything else that permitted such awesome real-time, in the moment, communication. Just sayin’… pretty awesome.

Our struggle now isn’t the media, but finding the attention to dedicate to it all… Exciting stuff.

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This is a fun TV news excerpt from 1981 (1981!!!!) that talks about the end of the newspaper and how it will be replaced by the computer. Techcrunch posted this earlier this month, but I just found it again, and thought it would be neat to post. I stole the title of this post from typographer David Carson’s book of the same name, kind of as a tongue in cheek move (because print will never die, though, many folks are sounding the death knell for print communications). However, as a graphic/Web designer turned developer turned strategist and also a letterpress printer, I know all too well the argument for Web over print, though I haven’t had much opinion with regard to the demise of newspapers. It’s sad, because I’m sentimental, but outmoded things make way for the new in our society; such is the cycle of progress. Anyhow,this is a fun and interesting video that shows just how far things have come.

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