Dear Axel, all,
Olaf’s point is most important. Only sustainable co-operation, support and contribution of industry experts provides new standards, applications, profiles. Including the participation of users, printing and prepress companies – supported by their associations. This worked for many years: Great efforts of a small number of individuals and companies for the benefit of the industry on international level.
I also want to clarify the misunderstanding with respect to the funding of bvdm. There is no public funding of bvdm and it‘s regional associacions vdm. The associacions are funded only via membership fees. Second, revenues from activities such as additional consulting sevices and training activities offered to the industry (users, member companies). Members of the associations (vdm) are german printing companies, prepress and postpress companies – the users in the industry. Bvdm/vdm is the german employers association of the printing and media industries (like UNIIC in France www.com-unic.fr). The membership is voluntarily. Many companies are not member of the associacion (vdm) – but are taking advantage of the benefits anyway. This includes e.g. development of professional training, job profiles, curriculae; development and support of standards, technical solutions; economic support and representation (industry policy, regulations, taxes on national and european level).
The manufacturers of machinery, materials and systems are not funding bvdm/vdm either. They are running their own associacions such as vdma (machinery), vdp (paper), VdL (printing ink). In many cases the manufacturers – as suppliers of the printing industry (users) – have different positions e.g. with respect to quality and performance of delivered goods and services. This is in some cases subject of negotiations between bvdm and supplier associacions (agreements or recommendations) – e.g. the terms for the commissioning of printing presses, prepress and postpress equipment (guidelines, technical criteria, testing procedures).
However, bvdm/vdm and manufacturers associations are co-operating on many topics, e.g. the support and further development of print media, on national and international level. Examples are www.fr.twosides.info/ www.printpower.eu/ Probably the most important area of co-operation between bvdm/vdm, manufacturers and other organisations (ECI, Fogra) is the development of technical standards and applications, see above. This is established for many years and the prerequisite for a successful development of technical quality industry standards and application tools (bvdm/ECI/Fogra …).
Best Regards
Karl Michael
(senior consultant at bvdm 1980-2016)
***
Karl Michael Meinecke
E-Mail: karlmichael.meinecke@online.de
Von: eci-en-bounces@lists.callassoftware.com [mailto:eci-en-bounces@lists.callassoftware.com] Im Auftrag von Olaf Drümmer
Gesendet: Dienstag, 7. Februar 2017 12:05
An: Mailing List [ECI-EN]
Cc: Olaf Drümmer
Betreff: Re: [ECI-EN] eci offset profiles surface finished.
Hi Axel
I don't think anybody was offended! I just wanted to point out that everybody - including a 'little prepress manager' - has the freedom to decide where to invest his/her resources.This does not mean that it **has to be you** who should invest in the development of the requested new profiles. But it could be you... (or just about anybody else in the industry).
Olaf