Rate of Change
There have been just 4 transitions in ‘publication’ in recorded history:
Oral to written word: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Writing#The_beginning_of_writing
Note here: the invention and widespread adoption of writing in general is why we have a recorded history to begin with. So from 200,000 BCE or thereabouts until 3000 BCE – The ancient Atlanteans could have met and defeated both the Giants from Space and the Lizard People from the Center of the Earth, but since they didn’t write anything down, we just don’t know. Could an advanced society exist without literacy? I don’t know; the internet seems to do OK [*rimshot*]
— a strong master/apprentice system would work, and if one can get hands-on with any mechanical technology while an expert simultaneously explains it to you, then you can likely get by; European medieval tech reached some pretty awesome heights (clockworks, windmills, agriculture, architecture, small-shop manufacturing) while being 99.9% illiterate.
Aside: Atlantean High School Shop Class was probably awesome
Hand-written copies to movable-type/printing press: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Printing_press
Movable type is great stuff, but the addition of the “press” made such an impression [heh.] that “press” is still a short-hand for much of the publication industry.
Note here: the basic tech behind Gutenberg (woodcarving unto blocks, or casting metal to make type; a vertically operated press to apply uniformly distributed force unto a flat plane) existed as early as the Roman Empire, 1st Century CE: the term “press” derives from the operationally-identical wine presses that had been in use for over 1000 years by the time Gutenberg sets up shop (records are sparse, understandably, but Wikipedia cites 1436.)
It might be best to compare Gutenberg to Henry Ford – neither was the sole inventor or innovator of the technologies they combined, but each engendered a revolution after that combination of several ideas birthed a single new production method that could be adopted and adapted by others.
I just handed someone a graduate thesis. [again.]
Vertical to Rotary:
Most of you were following along just fine right up to this point.
{sigh.} I’m striving to do this without puns (without additional puns) but I can’t: Rotary Printing was revolutionary. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rotary_printing_press
There are a number of ways to translate linear motion into rotary motion (the internal combustion engine springs to mind) but on an industrial scale, whether we consider wind- and waterwheels, steam turbines, or electrical motors — the ‘native’ form of many (if not most) power options is rotary. If one were looking to build an industrial-scale ‘press’, eventually you have to abandon the ‘press’ part, technologically if not linguistically.
The advantage of rotary is speed. The progress continues despite any obstacle (so long as we can still talk to each other) but the acceleration of knowledge is an integral function dependent on speed.
From an artistic standpoint, quality physical 4-color offset printing is amazing. Not an ultimate evolved form, but certainly an Optimal Expression, like marble and bronze from the Classical eras, or oil painting of the 1700s, or progressive rock from the 1970s.
I just handed someone a graduate thesis. [again.]
Rotary printing technology fueled the publishing boom from 1904 until 1992: faster was better, cheaper cost structures meant expansion into riskier (that is to say: more interesting) genres, empires of print were built and prospered until they got bought out by conglomerates, and it was all fun and games and profits until Internet.
Physical to Digital:
Until 1904, change took centuries. — oh, I suppose change has always been ‘rapid’, but scales of both time and geography were much more of an obstacle to Gutenberg in the 1450s than they are to the author-publisher or blogger of today.
In 1904, a major technological change was all-but-handed-to established publishing houses (and newspapers) who could use the innovations on the ‘back end’, unseen production to rapidly accelerate their other, primary function: namely, sales of the printed word to the public. The technology was quickly adopted before it could become disruptive. In fact, it’d be another 6 decades or so before an ‘indy’ press could evolve, though the pulps of the 40s and 50s were certainly a precursor.
[and the indy press of the 1960s counter-culture relied not on industrial scale but now-inexpensive ‘antique’ hand-operated printing tech — one more graduate thesis, you’re welcome.]
Digital is not just an innovation in the back-end production, though. Distribution and customer demand are also directly impacted; our modern internet is much more like the free-for-all book market of 17th century Europe combined with the proto-newspapers of the late 18th century.
[Graduate theses, two of ‘em in fact: pick distribution or demand. No more freebies, though — from here you’re on your own.]
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Given that the ‘digital’ book revolution is only 42 years old at this point [Sorry, Amazon – you didn’t invent this market; you’re 36 years late to the party] I’d say, from a historical perspective—if not a business one—it is still way too early to call.
What we can expect from the new technology is that nothing is going to be the same again —
while also: there are certain aspects of writing that have been true since 1021 CE and the industry that has arisen since is just one more tool we, as authors, can use to be known — to get published.
From Atlantis to Homer to Horace to Gutenberg to Random Penguin.
- From the origin of speech until 3000 BCE: hundreds of thousands of years.
- From cuneiform to papyrus, from papyrus to vellum, from vellum to paper; millennia of technological progress: but the transition that matters is from scribes to print, 3000 BCE to 1450 CE.
- Print fosters scientific discussion, and engineering, and math; and eventually patents, and corporations, and corporate competition. In 1904, industry returns the favor with industrial scale printing technologies.
- And then, suddenly, digital and internet.
Hundreds of thousands of years, To thousands of years, To a single century, To a handful of decades, To Now.
Unless the whole of technology and civilization suddenly slows down: having everything change ‘overnight’ (once a year or so) is going to be expected. The hard part now is that technology is advancing faster than humans can accept and adopt it. The natural pace of change, on a human scale, is a single human lifetime.
How many changes can you accept in your lifetime? You and I will likely be more adaptable than some (who can’t program a VCR and don’t “do” computers) but even so: Our grandkids will come up with solutions to these technological ‘problems’ that seem alien to us.
