I was reading the PrintSouth Magazine today and this was the headline “I wonder how Gutenberg felt?” by Jim Lobaito. This is what the first three paragraphs say.
When Gutenberg ran his Bible off the press, I wonder if he was thinking about all the people he was about to put out of work? The Gutenberg Bible was the first major book printed with a movable type print press, thus ushering in the age of mass produced printed book. Suddenly ideas could be shared with the masses and humanity dramatically changed.
The printing press was an important step towards the democratization of knowledge and moveable type made it available to common man. Surely this was an exciting time to be in business or was it?
The people who transcribed books by hand for a living felt threatened by moveable type.
The story goes to tell the reader how web sites aren’t threatening to today’s printers. But this got me to thinking about how threatening we feel when something new comes along. We just installed a new digital press. It’s night and day different from Gutenberg’s printing press. It could be seen as a threat to the other printers in our town, or the pressman that runs our offset press. It’s faster, has better quality, and unbelievably easy to run. As good as it is, it will not replace the old ink on paper printing press any time soon.
The process of printing has changed over the years, and each change has put someone or a trade out in the street looking for a new jobs. I know there’s been times I’ve felt threaten by someone or a new printing company coming to town. The one thing I do know, is when I’ve been threatened, it has always has got my butt too moving. We can get in a rut and not want any changes in our day to day world. This is what the writer was saying about the people who transcribed books. Change comes with a price sometimes, and there are times when it doesn’t, but there’s one thing you can count on, there will be changes like them or not.
