A beginning, an ending, a beginning.

Hello world.
Meet Ginger.
Ginger's an Espresso Book Machine. Version 2.2. She joined the staff of Third Place Books in Lake Forest Park, a neighborhood on the Northern outskirts of Seattle, on November 9th, 2009.
Her Parents (I guess it's an apt description) are a group of crafty individuals from a company called On Demand Books.

So the relationship is pretty fresh. For a machine of such mechanical intricacies, Ginger runs pretty smoothly, and for those out there who haven't gone to the link yet, Ginger prints and binds a book in 5- 10 minutes (depending on page size).
It's pretty amazing.
It's why I started this blog.

In the weeks I've spent getting to know the the Espresso Book Machine (EBM) system, and it's associated database of millions of titles, I've learned a great deal. From layman's understanding of brute mechanical functions, & paper consistencies, to the deep well of obscure titles available just from Google Editions (those books you find on Google Books with full-preview PDFs and no Copyright).

Intermittently, I'll be posting about all these things and more, some thoughts on the future of the publishing industry, the survival of the independent bookstore, and the kinds of things Ginger and I will be doing under the aegis of Third Place Press.

I hope y'all come along for the ride.