Computers in Publishing

Archive Report

Growing Use of Computers in Publishing

The publishing industry is in the midst of its fourth revolution. The first revolution occurred more than 500 years ago, when Johann Gutenberg or one of his contemporaries invented movable type; the second took place in 1884, when Ottmar Mergenthaler patented the Linotype machine; and the third dates from 1905, when Ira Rubel, a New Jersey lithographer, built the first offset printing press. The latest revolution, the computer revolution, is barely five years old. Even in that short period, however, computers have gone a long way toward transforming the nature of newspaper and magazine publishing. A similar transformation is under way in the two other main branches of the industry—book publishing and commercial printing.

The computer is basically an electronic ...

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