Another story for OhmyNews or based on previously. just to show how far out of time I am. maybe it is the start of the summer, I will be back on real time by September or so.

I did several trade show reports for OhMyNews International, including IPEX and drupa. Usually I looked at how things were changing with better broadband, even if Korea on another level. This year IPEX and Cross Media were a major puzzle. I think this will have been the cross Media IPEX even though it was also the occasion when Cross Media was closed down. Maybe more on this below, a bit off topic.

As far as I can tell from the website there is not yet a list of the companies attending the shows that are part of K-Print Week, 27-30 August at Kintex, Goyang, Korea. There are four shows, or sections of the main two halls - packaging, digital, labels and the original one though this is not most of the space. As we found at ExCel floor plans can change so it will be interesting to see where the demand is for space should this change over the next few weeks.

Some think that drupa is now the major global show because Heidelberg and other major companies have decided not to book much space anywhere else. IPEX was about half the space as previously but the digital aspect was strong. There were several companies from Japan. Some speculate that this may be because of politeness, Japanese find it hard to cancel. I'm not sure about this, the products were interesting and the attendance numbers don't show the potential sites over time. Komori contributed to the Konica Minolta offer and also sponsored an ecology zone.

So I will be just as interested in which companies are not part of K-Print Week as those that are there. There will be enough info online to get an impression. Ohmynews in Korean could be one source as I find translation often works out.

Now back to Cross Media. It was never clear if the show was aimed at printers or the people they used to supply. When in Islington there was an interest in marketing and publishing but the show co-located with IPEX was concentrated on production. Maybe because of everything else going on few people from the classic print industry registered so the allocated area kept reducing. Although something similar will be part of the next IPEX the idea of a regular Cross Media show has been cancelled.

Meanwhile I keep coming across reference to the "Internet of Things" . Not sure what the internet was before, maybe the "Internet of Content". So the stands at IPEX about 3D printing and electronic circuits on fabrics were part of a major break.

Comment and links welcome, inside K-Print or somewhere near.