New spin on "Print on Demand"

Whilst printing on demand services such as lulu.com have helped many authors and academic publishers with handling small print runs of specialist publications, an entirely new twist to 'print on demand' is about to be unveiled at the University of Michigan Library. They have installed one of the first of the new generation of book printing and binding machines in which you order a book and it prints, binds and charges you for a copy. Of course it only works for out-of-copyright or copyright free materials, but think for a moment what this means. Supposing you need a copy of a literary classic to read on one of your courses or as you're about to set off on a trip, just pop down to the machine and print a copy for ten dollars and away you go!

Thanks to the Chronicle for highlighting this story.