By Ilya Marritz - WNYC News
In an era when e-books and tablets are gaining more traction, one long-time New York City entrepreneur has stepped into the fray with a device that weds digital storage capacity with the old-fashioned printing press: a book-making machine.
Jason Epstein, 83, is admired in the publishing world; he's worked with Nabokov, Mailer and Roth. But since the beginning of his career, Epstein has also pursued innovation in book publishing.
The Espresso Book Machine — a one-ton machine made of 15 feet of Plexiglas and metal that prints and binds custom books — is his invention, and can be found at the McNally Jackson bookstore in Soho. Paper flies off of trays, whirls through wheels and gets piled up in stacks. The book takes shape fast.
"Physical books is the way [great texts] have been preserved and handed down for 5,000 years, and I think that’s not gonna end now," Epstein said (Photo right).
A bookstore patron, Shagun Mehrotra, recently marveled over the machine. Mehrotra, a published author of books on infrastructure and climate change, said this machine could enable him to become his own publisher.
"If I have a manuscript and there are 450 pages of text, I could print 20 copies and do my book tour," Mehrotra said, adding that many books on highly technical subjects never find more than a few dozen readers.
The idea for the Espresso Book Machine emerged in the late 1990s, as book texts were being digitized. Epstein asked himself who would want to read War and Peace on a computer monitor?
"There had to be a device that would permit you to receive a digital file on demand and create it in the form of a book," Epstein said.
So he set about creating it, seeking investors and buying a patent for a relatively small printing press that could be installed in bookstores. Epstein likened his idea to an ATM for books.
For a time, the machine got a lot of buzz. Time magazine made the Espresso Book Machine invention of the year in 2007.
But so far, the device has made very little impact. There are only around 50 Espresso Book Machines in operation around the world. Epstein admitted it's taken more time than he had hoped to refine the device. But Xerox recently became a partner, and he insists he is poised to sell hundreds of machines in the next few years.
"And then we'll become the largest distributor of books in all languages in the world," Epstein said.
Read the full story at WNYC News
1 comment:
I want one.
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