Interpretation Gutenberg´s galaxy

Ing. Jiří Šnajdar 2013

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Under pressure of inner conflicts and nations´ migration comes in the year 476 to disintegration of Western Roman empire. In Europe comes to new division of labour, trade production is developing, comes to towns´ urbanisation, formation of society on national principles and formation of new power centres.

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Informal McLuhan comments this break on his own - medially : Speeding up with help of wheel, road and papyrus in constantly more homogenous and uniform Roman area enabled to use potential of Roman technologies. But typography provided the road and wheel with far considerable speed and overcame orders of Roman world. Gutenberg´s uniform continual and infinitely repeated products enabled to transfer any kind of complicated space to simple, flat and rational space.

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Together with significantly raised media speed accelerates also society progress in medieval Europe, from citizens arises bourgeoisie, pre-industrial production comes in useful, arise new social classes, expands also trade with overseas countries, comes to discovery journeys and beginning of colonialism. This produces new power relations and social stress, that results gradually in bourgeoisie revolution. We are on the threshold of new era.

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Predecessors of periodical press :

First written records in China, acta diurni, scribers in monasteries

Written information for aristocracy and tradesmen – information as goods

Written newspapers of town patriciate and tradesmen, first recorded are from Fugger´s bank house in  Augsburg

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Transportation system – enclosures to private letters, foot-couriers, post as source of information and means of distribution. In Austria-Hungary and consequently in Bohemia started regular posts in 1527 in management of aristocratic family of Taxis.

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Beginnings of commercial press :

At the beginning of 15th century is in Europe circa 1000 presses

From beginning of the 17th century started printers in the Netherlands, France, England publishing of popular books, songbooks, calendars.

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Newe Zeitung – in 16th century begins to appear among press products also disposable prints (notifications, leaflet newspapers and newspaper leaflets). Mostly included news about war fights, natural phenomenon, accidents, executions, overseas discoveries etc. Are assigned for wide public and issue during the whole 17th century.

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Beginning of periodical press Relation in 1605 in Strasbourg first newspaper with weekly periodicity

From the second half of 17th century issue first journals – in England The Daily Courant, in Germany Einkommende Zeitung, from beginning of the 18th century issue first magazines - D. Defoe issues The Review and J Swift The Examiner.

11Titelblatt der Relation von Johann Carolus (1609), der ersten Zeitung der Welt.

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The Daily Courant, first published on 11 March 1702, was the first British daily newspaper. It was produced by Elizabeth Mallet at her premises next to the Kings Arms tavern at Fleet Bridge in London.  The paper consisted of a single page, with advertisements on the reverse side.  Mallet advertised that she intended to publish only foreign news and would not add any comments of her own, supposing her readers to have "sense enough to make reflections for themselves."

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Beginning of the 18th century – commercial periodical press (conditions for its formation – news correspondence for private customers, state administration, post, fairs, about the year 1700 issue 1st newspapers in Northern America in Boston.

When Franklin established himself in Philadelphia, shortly before 1730, he established „The Pennsylvania Gazette.“

 

 

 

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First newspapers:

quarto format A4

extent 4-8 pages

front page decorated with engravings

edition 250 – 400 pieces, propagation by reading

newspapers were prepaid, local, weekly

 

 

 

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mainly political, diplomatic and army events

information from far, local news did not exist

simple groups of news without further segmentation according to importance or themes

factual neutral news without further editorial

 

 

 

 

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 In Bohemia:

first leaflet : Jindřichohradecké noviny (Noviny léta Božieho 1495), Newspapers God Summer 1495 from year 1495

16th century : leaflets with different themes : wartime, travelogue, sensations, politics,

Bílá hora, White Mountain 1620 – repercussion in so called municipal state, periodical press in German.

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 In our country – in Czech crown – part of Habsburg monarchy, is after White Mountain in the year 1618 complicated progression and the country as a whole passed through hard epoch : counter-reformation efforts and germanisation, exit of Czech intellectual elite in emigration, gradual German dominance in all parts of social life. It is presented that in the Czech crown countries was retardation against advanced Europe up to 100 years.

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1686 - 1687 Ordinari postzeitung (German)

1719 -1772 first Czech periodical newspapers Prague newspaper The Mail - Karel František Rosenmüller

1785 takes the concession Jan Ferdinand from Schönfeld

1786 se becomes the editor of Schönfeld newspaper V. M. Kramerius

 1789 Kramerius starts his own newspapers – Krameriusovy c. k. patriotic newspaper

From 1848 start issue magazines

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Print technique, Polygraphy:

Manual graphic techniques

Wood print

Wood engraving, copperplate, lino cut, lithography

Nature of typography device are movable letters

Mechanical hot composition - linotype

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The earliest surviving woodblock printed fragments are from China and are of silk printed with flowers in three colours from the Han Dynasty (before 220 A.D.), and the earliest example of woodblock printing on paper appeared in the mid-seventh century in China.

Block printing first came to Europe as a method for printing on cloth, where it was common by 1300. Images printed on cloth for religious purposes could be quite large and elaborate, and when paper became relatively easily available, around 1400, the medium transferred very quickly to small woodcut religious images and playing cards printed on paper. These prints were produced in very large numbers from about 1425 onward.

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Around the mid-fifteenth-century, block-books, woodcut books with both text and images, usually carved in the same block, emerged as a cheaper alternative to manuscripts and books printed with movable type.These were all short heavily illustrated works, the bestsellers of the day, repeated in many different block-book versions: the Ars moriendi and the Biblia pauperum were the most common. There is still some controversy among scholars as to whether their introduction preceded or, the majority view, followed the introduction of movable type, with the range of estimated dates being between about 1440 and 1460

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History of Printing

Woodblock printing (200)•Movable type (1040)•Printing press (1454)•Etching (ca. 1500)•Mezzotint (1642)•Aquatint (1768)•Lithography (1796)

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History of Printing •Chromolithography (1837)•Rotary press (1843)•Hectograph (1869)•Offset printing (1875)•Hot metal typesetting (1886)•Mimeograph (1890)•Screen printing (1907)•Spirit duplicator (1923)•Inkjet printing (1956)•Dye-sublimation (1957)•Phototypesetting (1960s)•Dot matrix printer (1964)•Laser printing (1969)•Thermal printing (ca. 1972)•3D printing (1984)•Digital press (1993)

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1904 offset printing

Basic print techniques – typographic, planography, intaglio printing

Computer (cold) composition

Printer as computer´s peripheral

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The linotype machine is a "line casting" machine used in printing. Along with letterpress printing linotype was the industry standard for newspapers, magazines and posters from the late 19th century to the 1960s and 70s, when it was largely replaced by offset lithography printing and computer typesetting. The name of the machine comes from the fact that it produces an entire line of metal type at once, hence a line-o'-type, a significant improvement over the previous industry standard, i.e., manual, letter-by-letter typesetting using a composing stick and drawers of letters.

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The machine revolutionized typesetting and with it especially newspaper publishing, making it possible for a relatively small number of operators toset type for many pages on a daily basis.

Before Mergenthaler's invention of the linotype in 1884, no  newspaper  in the world had more than eight pages.