Post-Show Predictions
by David M. Cole
Well, folks, it’s time again for that annual masochistic ritual, Cole’s NEXPO® predictions.
Since 1996, the TechNews editors have allowed me—nay, exhorted me—to use my post-NEXPO column to predict what would be hot at the next newspaper technical exhibition and conference. And since 1996, I have failed miserably at this task.
Far be it from me, though, to back down now. I’ve trashed my reputation so thoroughly that one more of these exercises in futility shouldn’t hurt. Much.
Last year in this space, I predicted that seven innovations would shake up NEXPO 2000. Let’s take them one-by-one.
My lead-off item was about computer-to-plate technology, and why it has taken so long to take off in the United States. My theory was the cost of the plate material, which I predicted would fall.
Oh, well.
On the bright side, though, there was some exciting CTP news at NEXPO. With the merger of the pre-press operations of Canada’s Creo Products Inc. and Israel’s Scitex Corp. Ltd., the new CreoScitex of Bedford, Mass., came to NEXPO with something previously unheard of in the newspaper industry: a CTP device that uses thermal, no-process technology for imaging. Its Trendsetter 2637 uses plates from Anocoil Corp. of Rockville, Conn., or Kodak Polychrome Graphics of Norwalk, Conn. Though the Trendsetter is still a little too slow for a metropolitan newspaper (it can do 60 broadsheet plates an hour; most metros need closer to 100), its less-expensive plates do not require processing. You get about 130,000 impressions, unless you “bake” on the image, yielding more than 1 million impressions.
So, though the prediction wasn’t thoroughly accurate, there was some heartening news in the CTP arena nonetheless.
Last year, I borrowed three predictions from 1996-97, when I said there would be a prevalence of enterprise-wide databases, intranet-based front-ends and automated page-layout tools at NEXPO 2000.
Again, oh well.
We still are hearing people talk about a database of databases, but as yet, only Digital Technology International of Springville, Utah, and Atex Media Solutions of Bedford, Mass., actually have introduced products that use the technology. And unfortunately for them, there still are no working examples at any publication.
Intranet-based front-end systems are taking baby steps. There seemed to be a lot of Web-browser-based classified and editorial text-entry systems out on the floor this year (Agile Enterprise of Nashua, N.H., the aforementioned Atex, CCI Europe of Kennesaw, Ga., GDT-Nova of Auburn, Calif., etc.) But I don’t get the sense that anyone is really committed to the concept. In fact, one supplier that showed a rough alpha of a classified Web-entry tool at NEXPO’98 completely denied any knowledge of such a product at NEXPO2000.
And automated page-layout tools? Once you get past DTI and Geac Publishing Systems of Tampa, no other suppliers seem to have come to that particular rescue.
Now, the good news: Last year, I predicted that the line between a print-publishing system and an online-publishing system would become less distinct.
Hey, I actually was right. In addition to the next-generation systems announced at last year’s NEXPO, systems from Geac, Open Pages Inc. of Westford, Mass., and Saxotech of Rockville, Md., showed the distinction was blurring. Also, longtime print maven Harris Publishing Systems Corp. of Melbourne, Fla., brought to NEXPO its new JazBox system, designed specifically for cross-media publishing.
But what of next year? What will we see at NEXPO 2001 in New Orleans? Here are a few predictions:
- Everybody will be an application-service provider, or ASP. We saw the beginning of this trend in San Francisco, and in New Orleans, we’ll get sick of the phrase. Not only will traditional software suppliers afford newspapers the ability to run their applications off-site on servers maintained by the supplier, but we will see more service-bureau environments as well.
- A continuation of the trend toward cross-media publishing systems, in which more and more activities will become automated.
- More automation in general. As suppliers learn that publishing’s biggest problem is the acquisition and retention of quality personnel, they will begin to build more automatic systems.
Oh, and for those of you who can count, I left out last year’s final prediction: that everything introduced in 1999 would work in 2000.
Wrong again. Can I pass that one along for another year?
Cole is a San Francisco-based newspaper consultant and editor of The Cole Papers, a monthly newsletter on technology, journalism and publishing. E-mail, dmc@colegroup.com; phone, (650) 994-2100; fax, (650) 994-2108. The opinions expressed are those of the author and not necessarily TechNews or NAA.