I found this via MakeZine but I think its one of the most awesome things I’ve ever seen. It’s a standard Laser printer and what looks like a Canon Inkjet printer combined with a fancy bit of mechanics to hold, fold and cut paper. The complete system can print a book, a real softcover book in a few minutes and will handle up to about 850 pages.

It’s a pity the system is patented because I would love to build and sell these but thats not going to happen. What amazes me is if this was combined with some of the opensource textbook projects and give it to schools or perhaps put in a central place in a town you could print textbooks for kids on demand, printing only those portions that were required for the class they were taking, whats even cooler is you could perhaps combine textbooks into one book making it easier to carry.

The system would also lower the cost of the book as publishers no longer need to worry about doing large runs of books, storing, shipping or even having an order handling department.