It's home to a variety of purveyors of pop music -- the Backstreet Boys, Britney Spears, O-Town -- in addition to Disney, Universal and SeaWorld, so Orlando, Fla., knows a thing or two about show business. We shouldn't discount it, then, when show-business activities take place within its confines.

The Newspaper Association of America's annual technology trade show, NEXPO 2002, will be June 21-25 at the Orange County Convention Center in Orlando. Those of use who will attend are going to hear the same tunes a lot.

There will be a certain amount of singing the blues, which is to be expected, with supplier attendance down and publisher participation expected to be at an all-time low because of the ongoing advertising recession. The interesting thing is going to be the similar tunes many of the pre-press suppliers are going to be singing. (For us, "pre-press" seems to extend from the newsroom and the advertising office all the way past the plate-making equipment.)

A number of suppliers are going to sing a new little ditty called "content management systems." I've been heavily researching content management systems for more than a year and I still don't know what they are, but more than a couple of companies that used to sell editorial front-end systems are now convinced they have figured this rubric out and are claiming to provide those features.

Another song that it seems like everybody is going to sing is that new tune, "We've Got Your Electronic Tearsheet Solution" (good beat, lousy lyrics). Back in October 2000, I had to decline a pitch from a free-lance writer asking if I wanted a story on electronic tearsheets -- systems that replace the need to tear out an ad from the printed paper and mail it to the advertiser as proof of publication. At that point there was only one company offering the service.

When we did get around to writing about electronic tearsheets last year (see The Cole Papers, November 2001) we found only three suppliers of the service. But within days of publication we got four complaints about products that weren't mentioned.

When we culled all the responses for this annual NEXPO preview, another six companies popped up with offerings. In all my years in this business, I have never seen a product category go from one supplier to more than a dozen in less than 24 months.

Perhaps it is the return-on-investment: An electronic tearsheet system can wipe out or redeploy a sizable number of clerks very quickly.

So, no matter how many exhibitors or publishing executives attend NEXPO 2002, this year will prove that newspaper technological research and development is not dead (yet, anyway).

But we didn't go through all those responses just to weed out the electronic tearsheet systems -- inside you'll find our estimation of the top 50 pre-press exhibits, each with one of our patented summations. We also provide you with a Top Seven list of booths to visit, because you probably can do seven in a day at the show, should you be obliged to handle it all in one day.

And the whole schmere is aided and abetted by a wonderful full-color map provided by Joe Shoulak, who has done our NEXPO maps since 1991.

Despite all those suppliers singing similar songs -- or at least humming similar tunes -- don't expect NEXPO 2002 to be full of harmony. Many publishing executives are bound to be contentious about the poor showing among suppliers, and many suppliers will be bitter about how few publishers attend.

There is no question that the newspaper industry -- suppliers, publishers and the Newspaper Association -- is going to have to figure out new ways to buy and sell technology. While I'm sure this won't be the last NEXPO, I'm equally sure that the industry is going to have to come up with an alternative to renting a giant exhibition hall and hoping to fill it.

Just like many boy bands, NEXPO may have lost its youthful charm.

-- David M. Cole; dmc@colepapers.net

Index

• Confab
• Exhibits 1-16
• Exhibits 17-34
• Exhibits 35-50
• Map
• Hellbox

Illustration: Joe Shoulak

The Top Seven exhibits to visit:

5. Advanced Technical Solutions Inc.: Full range of pre-press products puts ATS into the big leagues.

10. Baseview Products Inc. & Harris Publishing Systems LLC: Small system? Big system? These two sibling companies have it all.

12. Brainworks Software: This company can provide you with one-stop shopping (pre-press, business) and has true cross-platform systems.

13. CCI Europe: "True content management system" prototype is a must-see.

18. Digital Technology International: Many may have Adobe InDesign in their systems; only DTI has done it right.

26. Mactive Inc.: Can all those newspapers be wrong? The industry's ad-order-entry darling.

44. The Software Construction Co.: This company understands pre-press automation.

From THE COLE PAPERS, June 2002
Copyright © 2002, All Rights Reserved.