Frank Romano's History of Desktop Publishing

“The combination of the LaserWriter, PostScript, PageMaker and the Mac’s GUI and built-in AppleTalk networking would ultimately create desktop publishing.” (page 84). Today, everyone is a publisher. To read is to print. To download is to copy. Copies are stored and retrieved. Sources are cited. This is how we got here. History of Desktop Publishing by Frank Romano is a narrative catalog. The story ends just before now and suggests some of the probable next generation of media, means, and methods. 

From The Rational Optimist by Matt Ridley

By the standards of the past in the time before the Renaissance in Italy any improvement from the first typewriter could have sustained three generations over a century and today we would be enjoying the first teletypes in our homes. In science fiction we call that subgenre Steampunk: life in 2000 as seen from 1865. But that is not what happened. Instead, we have experienced a rapid evolution of tools for thinking and for the communication of those thoughts.

In the human lifetime after individual letters in lead type were no longer pulled from job cases and placed in composition sticks, type met ink and paper via keys, wheels, balls, film images, and matrices of 7, 9, or 24 striking wires. Ink was and is blown through magnets or fixed by electrical charges or by heat or both or chemical reaction with the paper and air.

Storage evolved through magnetic tape on large reels and small cassettes, floppy disks (first large and then soon smaller and denser), driven by direct friction contact or floating on a cushion of air. Semiconductor memory arrays are still mounted on the computer motherboard while others are conveniently removable even to be carried on a keychain. 

The genius of these rapid intellectual achievements, is exactly that many of them were incremental and just as many were truly new attempts to solve the same problems of transmitting ideas by giving permanent form to words.

In the 12th grade, his guidance counselor sent him to
Mergenthaler to seek a job interview. Romano went with a
classmate. Frank got the job but his classmate did not.

Frank Romano has a lot of good visibility as the historian of modern printing. Modern printing needed his formal investigations and detailed reports because the evolution was so rapid. Gordon Moore’s Law (observation) is that overall commonly available computing power has and will double every 2.5 years. “Moore’s Law is Dead” is a meme that asserts changes in the dimensions of understanding of the tools themselves. One path is that the changes are much greater; another is that they cease. 

Fortunately for us, Frank Romano is not alone and his Museum of Printing in Havehill, Massachusetts, is one of several institutions that preserve the tools, techniques, and traditions of the arts and sciences that instantiate and transubstantiate our thoughts across time and space. 

• Museum of Printing
• 15 Thornton Avenue, Haverhill, MA 01832
• The Museum of Printing is dedicated to preserving the rich history of the graphic arts, printing and typesetting technology, and printing craftsmanship.
  The collection contains hundreds of antique printing, typesetting, and bindery machines, as well as a library of books and printing-related documents.
  A unique holding is the Mergenthaler Font Library, the original drawings that were the starting point for manufacturing matrices for Linotype machines. Other font libraries are those for the Intertype Photosetter and the remains of the font library of the Photon Corporation (after the unfortunate destruction of much of this resource).
• The Museum will also become the home for the archives of the TUGboat editor, including many items related to TeX and to the typography of mathematics.
• Providence Public Library Special Collections
• The Updike Collection on the History of Printing
• 150 Empire Street, Providence, RI 02903
• Daniel Berkeley Updike was proprietor of the Merrymount Press in Boston.
• In addition to thousands of books (among them many early type specimen books), prints, ephemera, and some artifacts (including the matrices for the Montallegro and Merrymount types, commissioned by Mr. Updike for his own use), the collection includes Mr. Updike’s personal correspondence from 1878 to his death in 1941.
• An annual event is the Updike Prize for Student Type Design
• For more information, call +1 (401) 455-8021.
• It is best to plan ahead and make arrangements to see this collection.
• Rochester Institute of Technology
• Cary Graphic Arts Collection
• 90 Lomb Memorial Drive, Rochester, NY 14623-5604, USA
  Phone: (585) 475-3961
  Fax: (585) 475-6900
• Dedicated to graphic communication history and practices, this library is included in the curriculum of several courses offered by RIT's College of Imaging Arts and Sciences.
• Among the holdings is the most substantial collection in America on the work of Hermann Zapf, who held the Melbert B. Cary Distinguished Professorship at RIT from 1977-1987.
• They have many videos posted on their YouTube channel, including a tour of the press room and use of their Goudy printing press.
• Stanford University Library
• Information about opening hours and library locations can be found here.
• Department of Special Collections
• Donald E Knuth papers, 1962-2015 - Held offsite; must be reserved at least 48 hours in advance.

https://www.cincinnatitypeprintmuseum.org/

These preservations are valuable because they are beautiful and their operations are harmonious and parsimonious. And they work. These are the moorings and anchors of our fragile civilization. 

PREVIOUSLY ON NECESSARY FACTS

Raymond Loewy 

Michael Shermer's Moral Arc

The Rational Optimist and the Grand Complication 

Hypatia of Alexandria 

Bringing Philosophy to Athens: Aspasia of Miletus

Aphorisms

I am the point-of-contact for a support group here in Austin. I joined as a member and inherited the work when the person before me had to move forward. This kind of work is something that I do by the numbers: I do not have a talent for it. Discussing the agenda (which is to say, "gossiping") with one of the regulars, they said about another member that the other person seems to be "worshipping the problem instead of finding a solution." I asked if that was a quote and they did not know. 

I do not have a solution but I admire your problem.
https://www.ashleighbrilliant.com/

Googling that phrase brought evermore many hits from after 2018 and fewer before. I eventually found Ashleigh Brilliant, creator of Pot Shots. He has thousands of them, all copyrighted and aggressively protected. Oddly enough, I found nothing by Ashleigh Brilliant in the libraries of the University of Texas, the City of Austin, or the City of Kyle. So, I went to Abe Books and bought five from two sellers. 

https://schaffnerpress.com/books/short-flights/

The Austin Public Library did have Short Flights, a book of aphorisms from an array of modern writers. Ashleigh Brilliant is one of them, so this came up in a wider search. I am reading through that now as I wait for the books.

Right now, I have two original aphorisms:

You can only be as open with others as you are with yourself.

Not much happens in a society that punishes ambition.

In republican Rome, ambition, literally ambling about glad handing strangers to make friends among the voters, was a crime. 

The best one that I learned somewhere else is a post title here: "How do you make God laugh? Tell Him your plans."

PREVIOUSLY ON NECESSARY FACTS

Longevity 

Aaron Feldman: Buy the Book Before You Buy the Coin 

Dealers Make the Show: ArmadilloCon 41 Day 3 Part 2 

Contradictions in the Patentability of Numbers 

Armadillocon 44: Day 3

Hard science topics, especially on space exploration, are always a panel or a presentation at Armadillocon. 

“Space Tries to Kill You” (7 August 1100 HRS) featured moderator William Frank, NASA Chief Training Officer, backed up by panelists Alan J. Porter, Marina Lostetter, Avery Parks, Dantzel Cherry, and Stina Leicht with lots of audience interaction. He said that there would be no Kobayashi Maru an unwinnable scenario that requires reprogramming the computer to win. Instead, Bill Frank read scenarios, and then first the panelists and finally the audience offered their solutions to the emergencies. Throughout, Frank congratulated everyone on our clear thinking and encouraged us to apply to NASA.

You try to land on an asteroid and the surface rebounds coming up to meet you. (This is based on the recent discovery that some asteroids are not solid.)

There was a call for drones.
Frank said that orbiting is not possible but station-keeping is.
Another problem is that our billionaire boss who funded the mission scrimped on the budget and left out something we need now.
There was more discussion as the panel talked out this first exercise.

You wake up and smell smoke.

1. Alert the crew.
2. Call Mission Control.
3. Locate the source and open the vent to vacuum.
4. [etc.]
5. [etc.[
6.  Cut off power to the source
7. Get a portable vacuum cleaner because that will show the flow of smoke from its origin.
8. Push the FIRE alarm.
9. Leave. Close (open) (seal) all vents. Shut down the module.
10. Do not fight the fire.

Fire hangs in a sphere because there is no gravity. (I did not shout out that this has been known since 1857 and John Leonard Riddell’s “Voyage to the Moon.”) 

 

11.    There are two smoke masks for the crew.

12.    Troubleshoot the problem.

Among the crew were two millionaire space tourists and it was suggested with some humor that perhaps we did not need to alert them. In fact, said William Frank, you can assume that everyone has been trained in all procedures. So, consider them part of the crew. 

You are in a standard capsule (Apollo, Soyuz, Boeing Starliner, etc.). You have failure to separate from the booster. 

After much questioning for details and suggestions that were rejected as unworkable, we were told to abandon the crew module, get into the capsule, separate, and abandon the failed booster and module. 

I provide this here and now to help visualize
the problem. There was no PowerPoint.

Bill Frank said that your priorities are:

1. Crew safety.
2. Vehicle safety.
3. The mission.

Several times, it was suggested that our billionaire boss cut corners. In the final scenario, Stina Leicht said that our boss was a libertarian so our safety was not his  concern. Personally, I thought that was disingenuous. Libertarians join the rants against crony capitalism and the incompetent narcissists who rake in the loot from what was classically called “rent-seeking” and in the case of the Former President was literally and truly rent-seeking from artful deals involving eminent domain. 

Other Panels and Break-out Sessions

 

Search Engine Optimization for Writers and Artists (12:00 Noon. Matthew Bey Moderator with Porter, Hardwick, Chang, and Sarath, all with SEO street cred.) I took a lot of notes. When I tried it the next morning, nothing worked. Apparently, Google Blogger works very differently than WordPress. I could follow none of the pathing. One thing I can do is go back and put alt text descriptions in all of the illustrations. I never cared if this blog was popular. I get paid to write for others. Here I write for myself. After 11 years, I have had over 424,000 page views mostly in the USA with occasional spikes from Russia, India and China; and yet only seven followers. 

 

Ask an Archaeologist with Dr. Betsy Bevis. (2:00 PM – back on civilian time). Prof. Bevis’s specialty is classical archaeology, the Greeks, Romans, and their contextual civilizations. It is an area that I know well enough having written a dozen articles about classical and archaic numismatics for The Celator. She was informative, enlightening, engaging, and lively. She exposed errors in popular media such as The Mummy and she spoke candidly though carefully about the relationships that are subjected to trial by ordeal on a dig. (It can cost you your marriage, your career, and your friendships.) During her presentation, Dr. Bevis did have some problem with environmental noise impacting her hearing but we all worked with her on that and no one was left out. 

 

Howard Waldrop: A Fireside Chat with Mr. National Treasure (15:00 hours).

We all enjoyed his flowing monologue across many streams of thought and experience about how books become movies (or not). “People ask me how I’m doing. Hell, I’m in assisted living and they let me out once in a while to do things like this, you know, so that’s it…. Now, speaking of Felicia Day, as I was saying awhile ago…”

 

PREVIOUSLY ON NECESSARY FACTS

Elon Musk and the Audacity of Entrepreneurship 

Virgin Galactic VX01 and VX03 

Ayn Rand and Star Trek 

“Star Trek: Discovery” and the Conflict of Values 

 

Armadillocon 44 Part 2

The convention lost two of its founders, Willie Siros and Joe W. Bratcher III and memorials were held to celebrate both of them. Willie Siros was also a founder of FACT the Fandom Association of Central Texas. FACT is the engine of creation and administration for Armadillocon. His bookstore was Adventures in Crime and Space. Sara Felix’s tribute was posted here: https://file770.com/willie-siros-1952-2022-tribute-by-sara-felix/. Joe Bratcher owned Malvern Books, a cornerstone of Austin culture and a solid supporter of the convention. 

6 August 14:00 HRS (The show guide really is in military time.) Tiara Workshop. Artist Sarah Felix. Impressed with the tiaras that she bestowed on the guests of honor during the opening ceremony, I was hoping to make something that Aragorn might wear but that was not the kind of identical kits that we got. I left and went to the dealer’s room. Laurel worked on hers but brought it home incomplete. This was definitely a waste of $50 leaving us with unwanted bric-a-brac cheaper than Hobby Lobby or Michael’s. 

 

I returned to the Dealers Room for a couple of hours, though I still only met about half of the dealers because of our own attenuated schedule. 

 

Pick a Little, Talk a Little: The Art of Lockpicking by Tex Thompson (1600 HRS).

Tex Thompson loids a lock.

How to open a lock with a credit card.

Back in 2019, Tex Thompson moderated a panel on how to moderate panels. I learned a lot from that session about working either side of the dais. Tex missed last year’s con and I missed her. This year she was back with a new career as a locksmith. (Laurel and I have been locksporters since we lived in Ann Arbor. Here in Austin, I donated several mechanisms to their trove and they awarded Laurel a pair of handcuffs.) Tex Thompson’s presentation was a show-and-tell with hands-on cut-aways from the 19^th through 21^st centuries. She covered the fallacies in cinema and the tools of the trade including rakes, bumping, and snappers. She touched on some of the forensics that reveal when a lock has been picked. We had a good time and helped her schlep her gear back to her car. 

Fannish Feud. (1700 HRS). Our friend, Kurt Baty, was on the fan side. We never watched Family Feud but the rules were easy enough with the pivot being that the answers came from a poll of the convention. So, they were not necessarily right and you have to guess what “most” people might have said. Name a vampire… Name a fan artist … What was the fishing boat in Jaws? … etc. The fans won. 

 

The Future of Identity in SF (1900 HRS). After a one-hour hiatus, the convention picked up again. I was really looking forward to this. 

 

Much of the discussion here was about the distinction between artificial intelligence (parking a car) and artificial general intelligence (being “human” or something like that). Stina Leicht pointed out that historically, people have modeled the mind with the technology of the times from fluids and humors to clockworks to computers but the mind is not any of those. 

Ryan Leslie mentioned “evolutionary compensation” but did not extend that thread. (See: “Compensatory evolution means that a locus will evolve an effect size in a different direction to (i.e., negatively correlated with) the effect sizes at other loci.” NIH here.)

 

John Hormor Jacobs alluded to “Midworld” an AI that makes art. (See “Midjourney’s Enthralling AI art generator goes live for everyone” at PC World here.). He then reminded us of the truism that good fiction is a way to consider the human condition and the interesting question about AI is what it says about us. How would perfect memory affect your relationship with your spouse? (Laurel and I only exchanged sidelong glances even though we wanted to elbow each other in the ribs and chortle “har-har-har.”) Jacobs said, “A genie is no good to a writer unless it is let out of the bottle.” 

 

Eva L. Elasique (self-identified Filipina-American queer feminist) said that her background as a biologist (studied; no degrees) led her to consider epiphenomenal alien intelligences. That sounded deep at the time. However: “Epiphenomenalism is the view that mental events are caused by physical events in the brain, but have no effects upon any physical events. … Huxley (1874), who held the view, compared mental events to a steam whistle that contributes nothing to the work of a locomotive.” Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy, "Epiphenomenalism" here. 

 

Jacobs and Leitz exchanged comments on gender fluidity in a future that lets you change it like clothing and how that could lead to species fluidity. Leitz pointed out that we now know that in the sterile environment of a space station, your immune system has not much to do and you develop odd allergies, such as to plastic. (That general claim is known though I did not find a reference to plastic. See NASA Human Research Aug 18, 2014 "Study Reveals Immune System is Dazed and Confused During Spaceflight" here.) 

 

Moderator Hilary Ritz asked, “What are the qualities that you see as essentially human and that you would not want to lose?” John Hormor Jacobs offered kindness. 

 

How Near-Future Science Fiction has Changed (2000 HRS) Moderator David Afsharirad asked, “What is the most disruptive technology that has turned science fiction on its head?” 

• For Rhonda Eudaly it is cellphones. She added that we have to accept that we will not know what the next big thing is. 
• For Alan J. Porter it is miniaturization. 
• William Ledbetter looked to 3-D printing. 
• John K. Gibbons pointed out that the cellphone became “a layer of concern” because of the Internet. 
• Bill Frank (NASA chief training officer) offered the brain-machine interface that allows prosthetics and much else, adding that the pilot of a craft will soon become a redundant component. 

David Afsharirad asked, “Is there something, a speculative element, that must be in a story set 40 to 50 years in the future?”

• Alan J. Porter suggested artificial intelligence. 
• Rhonda Eudaly said that we have abandoned the reality of Covid. It is no longer part of a story in mainstream entertainment, adding that more pandemics seem inevitable. 
• John K. Gibbons added that previous pandemics lasted up to 50 years.
• Alan J. Porter came back to machine learning and Siri-Alexa voice interfaces that will make keyboards obsolete. 
• Bill Frank looked to algorithmic conditioning, learning the interface, being conditioned by the algorithms around you adding that it is informative to watch a two-year old learn a device like a cellphone or pad. 
• John K. Gibbons said that climate change has gone beyond the centerpiece of the plot to being a fundamental condition. “It is kind of crazy if you ignore it.”
•  Returning to nanotechnology, Ledbetter underscored new material coatings and changes in the human body.

David Afsharirad asked, “What do we obsess over when predicting the future?” 

• John K. Gibbons replied that it is not the technological projection of space travel but that the extrapolation of it has not aligned with the reality of space exploitation back then. 
• Turning on that point, Alan J. Porter said, “… but now we have Heinlein’s The Man Who Sold the Moon.” 

“What could we not see coming?” Fifty years ago everyone smoked cigarettes and the roles of women were still in the  traditional molds. As the discussion traveled along the table, Rhonda Eudaly said, “ It’s not the nanotech. It’s the people.”

 

The End of Capitalism (2100 HRS) Let’s discuss writers who defy the saying, “It’s easier to imagine the end of the world than the end of capitalism.” What are your favorite anti-capitalist works of SFFH? How have you experimented with world building in your own writing?” (Rick Klaw moderator with Martha Wells, Donna Dechen Birdwell, William Ledbetter, Clayton Hackett, Sim Kern.) 

 

Referring often to Ursula K. LeGuin’s The Dispossed, not only did none of them actually answer the question with examples from their own publications in which they imagined non-capitalist economies or societies without economics, all of the anti-capitalist clichés were deeply infused with ignorance. For me, leading the list was the narrative that we evolved from barter to money and the best alternative to money would be a return to barter. Anthropologist (and anarcho-communist) David Graeber (Debt: The First 5000 Years) asserted that we have no example of any society evolving from barter to money but rather barter is what people resort to when money fails. 

 

Another rant on the evils of capitalist colonialism was launched from allusion to England’s primogeniture laws which sent younger sons out into the world to exploit people. I must point out that they were not Dutch capitalists floating bonds or Jewish moneylenders charging interest. The British colonialists were the best that could be offered by the kind of society all of the writers seemed to want: traditional, landed, family-based, community-based, altruistic, feudal. In fact, the point was made explicitly that medieval lords cared for their serfs and took care of them and the serfs only worked about 140 days a year. William Ledbetter did note as an aside that of course they did not have a lot of material wealth.

 

I could go on forever. (I presented "The Future of Money: Beyond Solars and Credits" at Armadillocon 41.) At the end, Clayton Hackett suggested that an innovative monetary medium would lose value over time so that you are forced to spend it in order to keep the economy going. I understand the concept of fiat inflation. I only fail to see the innovation.

 

PREVIOUSLY ON NECESSARY FACTS

 

The Future of Money 

Mere Gold is Not Enough: Hayek’s Denationalisation 

Numismatics: The Standard of Proof in Economics 

Worker’s Paradise Promised an End to Money 

 

Armadillocon 44 Day 1 and Day 2

The 2022 convention was almost back to pre-Covid glory. The first night and the second day and night were productive for us. Different from our previous attendance, Laurel and I did not split up for separate break-outs because fewer options were offered. 

 

Program cover by
Lauren Raye Show
with Sara Felix 

We both enjoyed the welcoming session (technically three hours into the con). Master-of-ceremonies Cass Morris stole the show, and the guests of honor—Darcie Little Badger, Ellen Kleges, Lauren Raye Snow, and Fonda Lee—were extroverted and engaging. You do not always get that with writers. (Snow was the Guest Artist.)

We spent an hour chatting with convention panelist Kurt Baty and his friends. Kurt and I met in 2012 in another context and it was Kurt who finally talked me in to going to Armadillocon 39. He is one of the long engaged fans and has been the Fan Guest of Honor. My impression of science fiction conventions was informed by two trekker cons. Kurt kept insisting that this convention is for writers, artists, and publishers and he was right. 

 

Laurel and I then attended “Fighting and F*cking: Writing Action Scenes of All Kinds.” For us, Armadillocon provides insights into the creation and production of literature, both books and cinema. Laurel’s genre is mystery; mine is science fiction. She is an avid fan; I am not. We got some general pointers for carrying action. Talking this out on the way home, we agreed that not every conflict of values is resolved with a fist fight. Also, their theories of sexual enounter were somewhat lacking given that the many aliens of science fiction and fantasy could include fertilization requiring five different participants, one of them non-sentient. Just sayin’… all they came up with was two people (humans) fighting or fucking, with more pointers for the combat than the love, to say nothing of how the one can become the other, as with Mr. & Mrs. Smith.

Guests of Honor receive tiaras.

Day 2 started late because our cat, Sunny, had a veterinary appointment. I spent the first hour in the dealer’s room. As important as the break-outs are, the dealers pay for the show and many of them are publishers or self-publishing authors. 

 

Ryan C. Bradley – Author of Saint’s Blood. For promoting his book, he bought pens that look like syringes with blood. They only cost 66 cents each on Amazon. He said that this book took five years to write and was inspired by his great uncle, Saint Rafael Guízar y Valencia, who was canonized in 2006. 

 

Kristina Downs, Ph. D. – representing the Texas Folklore Society which is now at Tarleton State University. Founded in Austin in 1909, they moved to Nagodoches in 1971 before adopting their new home in 2020. The good professor told me that folklore has no boundaries. It can be stories, music, crafts, or cooking; and it takes no special training to participate. Folklore includes the family saga: how they came to Texas. 

 

John Baltisberger of Madness Heart Press has 65 books in print and is looking to cut down on that. However, he is not abandoning his author Susan Snyder, a marine biologist who wrote the Encyclopedia Sharkploitanica and other books about all things shark.

Snyder, Downs, Baltisberger, and Snyder

Gretchen Rix and Roxanne Rix – author Gretchen and publisher Roxanne do business as Rix Café Texican. They sell their books through Amazon, contracting the cover art from Streetlight Graphics (https://www.streetlightgraphics.com) They have over 20 titles across several genres.

Allan Kaster – editor and publisher was someone I recognized from a previous convention when he was selling off the last of his books-on-tape audio cassettes. (He has been in business a long time.) 

 

J. Darris Mitchell – was selling a book to Laurel when I approached. I remembered him, also, because he autographs his books with a very nice drawing of a bug of your choice. I got a scorpion a couple of years ago and Laurel got a firefly for her purchase. 

Rix, Kaster, Jacobs and Mitchell. Freddie Jacobs who was holding the fort
for his father, John Hormor Jacobs,
who was at one of the many panels he served on. 

Armadillocon 42 (2020) was cancelled for Covid-19. We attended Armadillocon 43 last year, 15-17 October, 2021, but I did not write it up. Recovering from Covid-19, the convention was much downsized and the presentations were less than stellar. Reviewing the schedule now, the only two that I remember were “25 Things You Didn't Know About James Bond” by Alan J. Porter on the first night and “Creating Realistic Medicine in SF/F” by Jen Finelli, MD on the last day. Even that as published (follow menu options from https://armadillocon.org/d43/) was different from my memory because I remember a different person speaking with great emotion about her recent experience as a combat medic. 

 

PREVIOUSLY ON NECESSARY FACTS

 

Armadillocon 39

Armadillocon 40 Part 2 

Armadillocon 41 

Armadillocon 41 Day 3: Dealers Make the Show