[Crazy Ideas][Never-gonna-happen] Mechanical Keyboard: the book

DanielT · 02 Dec 2015, 15:46

7bit wrote: ↑If we still had 1985, we could make a magazine, called Keyboard Monthly with articles on latest finds, color-photo stories and an ads section.

Actually there is something like this. A monthly magazine would be something nice and interesting, and at some point all issues collected could lead to a book.

matt3o · 02 Dec 2015, 15:55

klikkyklik wrote: ↑Can I suggest that you pull back the reigns a bit and initially work backwards in order to determine if it's even financially viable (if you are indeed pursuing a book)? Contributing anything at this point is rather pointless until that is resolved, isn't it?

Not meaning to sound 7bit negative, just stating the obvious.

that mostly depends on number of pages and number of copies. I guess 100 copies would be a safe bet, I can check on pricing but in case we hit a wall we can always start a pre-sale. Cost per copy shouldn't be that bad, $30-50 probably? I'll check that but I don't think that is the show stopper.

mtl · 02 Dec 2015, 16:26

There are on-demand book printing services that I think would be affordable, even if the quantity is low. I can offer to help with typesetting.

It would be cool to see a chapter on the progress the community has made in recent years toward resurrecting the craft of building mechanical keyboards and advancing technology in various areas (key caps, cases, controllers / firmware, PCBs, etc.) and exploration of custom layouts. It would be pretty easy to tell the story in pictures, and a nice timeline would be cool too.

matt3o · 02 Dec 2015, 16:30

I'm pretty anal about print quality, it should be a one-of-a-kind thing, I wouldn't settle for low quality printing, but of course it is all down to pricing. I would go as far as taking an ISBN code, they are rather inexpensive.

mtl wrote: ↑It would be cool to see a chapter on the progress the community has made in recent years toward resurrecting the craft of building mechanical keyboards and advancing technology in various areas (key caps, cases, controllers / firmware, PCBs, etc.) and exploration of custom layouts. It would be pretty easy to tell the story in pictures, and a nice timeline would be cool too.

mmh that is a nice idea, don't know how far we could go with that, I mean it could be a book of its own...

SL89 · 02 Dec 2015, 16:34

So if i get this idea, its like a coffee table book, with lots of high quality photos, and blurbs about the boards?

I don't see why this would be too cost prohibitive. Would it be hardcover or softcover?

Regarding the idea of a magazine. I absolutely think that it is totally doable, there are some pretty niche publishers who could pick it up as well. Maybe an annual magazine or something, with heritage / vintage stuff and contemporary / innovative stuff all on display. Our forum, unlike our boards, is a very ephemeral thing due to the nature of the internet.

Muirium · 02 Dec 2015, 17:48

ISBNs also come in sequential blocks. We could reserve some for Deskthority's publications department.

JotaCe · 02 Dec 2015, 18:17

An high quality digital ebook version would be nice!
Also, I'd like to help as a photographer, however there's the question of the models, since I "only" have a Corean custom and a generic TKL...

Muirium · 02 Dec 2015, 18:23

Much easier sharing photos than it is sharing keyboards. We've got a fair few good photographers here. Hell, Photekq alone has the core of the Cherry chapter covered!

I'd rather see shots of keyboards in nice environments than regular sterile comparison shots anyway. No need to limit things through a single, or too few, photographers. Instead, each of us can concentrate on what we know best.

matt3o · 02 Dec 2015, 19:21

there's another interesting opportunity. Basically we could design the book and give it to a service, anyone who wants it could buy it directly from the service (that prints and ships on demand). It's less exciting maybe, but that reduces the initial investment to basically zero.

zslane · 02 Dec 2015, 19:48

Print on demand is great, but it gets expensive when you're talking about full-color interior pages. I've used Lulu.com to make many books: softcover, hardcover, full-color, and grayscale. The prices for grayscale are very reasonable, even for hardcover books with large (700+) page counts and glossy color covers. The prices for books with color interior pages becomes bracing; like triple the cost of grayscale pages. However, the results are impressive either way.

Now, given the file size limitations of the photos posted to the DT forums, I'm fairly certain their resolution won't be nearly enough for high quality print application. Which means either taking all new photos just for this book, or soliciting high-resolution originals from whomever posted the (down-sampled) forum pictures and hoping they are suitable.

002 · 02 Dec 2015, 22:45

What a cool idea! I would love to be a part of it in some way -- Topre history write-ups, photos or fact-checking

chzel · 02 Dec 2015, 22:51

I'm pretty sure everyone posting a good quality photo here has the original saved and probably in a lossless format (RAW or DNG etc.)

Matt3o's idea is great, and I'd like to help either as a photographer (although no one nominated any of my photos for DTA

:woefully crying on the floor:

) or to chip in for the publishing investment!

Regarding cost, I tested a quote for Blurb via Lightroom, a medium photobook (20x25 cm) with the best paper and quality, with image wrapped hardcover with 240 pages (120 photos and 120 blank/text pages) comes at 105$ per print for low volume, and gets 10% off for 10-50 prints and 15% off for 50-100, and 20% for 100+.
Not bad at all. With a pre-sale round and a bit of investment from some of us, it's feasible.
And I'm sure we could find better prices out there.

Edit: I was mistaken, the price is with the mid-quality paper. Best quality jumps to 140$. And they offer print-on demand as well.
I haven't actually printed with Blurb before, but it's easy to get a quote through Lightroom!

webwit · 02 Dec 2015, 22:56

Will it have naked keyboards?

Muirium · 02 Dec 2015, 23:00

Tastefully posed…

Meanwhile, perhaps I'm the only or on an SLR who doesn't shoot in raw. Pretty pointless on the old 350D. Noise is its signature style!

chzel · 02 Dec 2015, 23:05

I started shooting RAW ever since I got Lightroom 5, I like the workflow.
But now, with the D7200 I can't...Stupid Adobe won't add support to LR5...I need to buy LR6 which won't support tethering!
I feel like Adobe is like MS, we love to hate them!

matt3o · 02 Dec 2015, 23:37

002 wrote: ↑What a cool idea! I would love to be a part of it in some way -- Topre history write-ups, photos or fact-checking

I was hoping for your help on the Topre side

chzel wrote: ↑Regarding cost, I tested a quote for Blurb via Lightroom, a medium photobook (20x25 cm) with the best paper and quality, with image wrapped hardcover with 240 pages (120 photos and 120 blank/text pages) comes at 105$ per print for low volume, and gets 10% off for 10-50 prints and 15% off for 50-100, and 20% for 100+.
Not bad at all. With a pre-sale round and a bit of investment from some of us, it's feasible.
And I'm sure we could find better prices out there.

if we have to produce 100+ we can surely find a better deal than Blurb, unless we decide to go print-on-demand in which case that would probably be our best bet.

webwit wrote: ↑Will it have naked keyboards?

mmmh naked!

webwit · 02 Dec 2015, 23:42

Artistically of course. In grainy black&white.

Btw I'd buy one! Great idea. One for on the table below the Deskthority Calendar.

matt3o · 02 Dec 2015, 23:49

webwit wrote: ↑One for on the table below the Deskthority Calendar.

for a second I thought you were serious

matt3o · 03 Dec 2015, 11:18

So the structure could be (not necessarily in this order)

- Typewriters. Few pages, old and "modern", I believe it is important to introduce the QWERTY layout and reason why initial IBM keyboards were so good
- IBM Beamspring, Model F, Model M (we need an industrial SSK)
- Alps, I have to check on this. Would be nice to take pictures of all switches
- Cherry, again switches and clones
- Topre, Realforce, HHKB, some specialty keyboards only 002 knows
- Specialty keyboards like Symbolics, Nuclear data and various Russian crazy stuff
- Modern stuff, like corsair RGB backlight, novatouch, Poker, etc...
- Korean Customs and high quality custom keyboards in general (ergodox, whitefox

, etc)

Ideas?

002 · 03 Dec 2015, 11:32

I think that's a pretty good high level timeline and would easily give enough content to fill a book. As long as it's not approached with the idea that it's going to be an encyclopaedia, I think it will be a fun project. Also, I have no idea if this helps but the other day I was watching this vid on YouTube and I was really impressed what these German guys threw together as a self-published book on a niche collecting hobby. Maybe we could contact them and get some pointers, do's/don'ts, etc.

matt3o wrote: ↑ - Alps, I have to check on this. Would be nice to take pictures of all switches

Man, that could be a whole book in itself

matt3o · 03 Dec 2015, 11:45

002 wrote: ↑As long as it's not approached with the idea that it's going to be an encyclopaedia, I think it will be a fun project.

agreed

002 wrote: ↑ Also, I have no idea if this helps but the other day I was watching this vid on YouTube and I was really impressed what these German guys threw together as a self-published book on a niche collecting hobby. Maybe we could contact them and get some pointers, do's/don'ts, etc.

Very interesting. That is more of an encyclopedia, but would be nice to know how they printed it.

002 wrote: ↑ Man, that could be a whole book in itself

I mean, would be nice to have a page with just switches... it doesn't need to be AAALLL of them

photekq · 03 Dec 2015, 15:30

It's a really great idea, it's just a question of what to include. There is so much information that could be put in there; it will be very hard to narrow it down.

hoggy · 07 Dec 2015, 13:57

I totally want a copy. Any chance of an ergonomic chapter?

Alkhar · 05 Nov 2017, 23:13

Hello, any news ?

JP! · 06 Nov 2017, 18:41

Necro, but a good topic nonetheless.