Topic: Pdf Printing

Adam Curry and John C. Dvorak open episode 617 of the No Agenda show, with Curry broadcasting from Tokyo and Dvorak from Northern California. They experience immediate technical difficulties with their Skype connection, attributing the delay to the show's intro jingle. The conversation shifts to Dvorak's frustration with modern web design and the difficulty of printing pages due to excessive JavaScript and advertising, leading to a brief debate over the merits of A4 paper versus American standards.

Modern print-on-demand technology utilizes high-speed toner-based machines rather than traditional offset presses to create books directly from PDF and Illustrator files. This system allows for "batch of one" manufacturing, where different titles can be printed and bound sequentially. While the technology is highly advanced, the resulting books often have a distinct feel and appearance that differs from traditionally manufactured volumes.