Interview: Revising the Glossary of Graphic Communications

Meet Joe Deemer. He is the resident editor of Printing Industries of America. I sat down with him to discuss his first large-scale project -- editing the Glossary of Graphic Communication, fourth edition.

What’s your background with this project?
This was my first project when I joined the company in January 2007. It didn’t come out until the Summer of 2008, so it was fairly involved. 

Why update now?
The last edition had come out the Summer of 1998. We felt it was time to update it and I was the new guy…which made me the man for the job, I guess.

Did you know much about the industry beforehand?
I knew a novice amount. I worked off and on in the printing industry for 10 years. I started mopping the webpress floors at a newspaper, and when I finished college, I joined the paper staff as a sports writer. I’ve been in various areas of that newspaper, which also did some commercial printing. So I’ve had some experience in the industry.

Was it difficult coming from a limited background?
This was a great first project because it forced me to read and become familiar with different areas of the industry. I’m certainly not an expert in it, but I certainly knew a lot more about it between doing articles for the magazine—editing them and laying them out—and doing this book project. It was pretty much a crash course in the industry.

The book was last updated in 1998, where do you start for that kind of project?
We took every book we published between 1998 and 2007 and stripped out their glossaries. There were around 30–40 books we used. They were on all kinds of different topics—prepress, process control, total production maintenance. Each one had a specialized glossary. I took all those word files and looked through the third edition of the glossary, and kept the definitions that matched. If the definition, or wording was a little different we would evaluate what definition went in.

If there were conflicting or similar definitions, would you consult with someone in the field?
That’s the nice thing about working at Printing Industries of America—you can just find the expert in the building and ask, “Which would you go with?” People were very helpful and people are always willing to share their knowledge.

What kind of stuff was added or removed between editions?
In a way, maintaining history is important and nothing was removed. Most of the new things we’ve added were Web-to-print, digital, and VDP. Those things made significant strides by the time we updated. There were a lot of environmental considerations we added in, as well as Lean manufacturing. Of course, it’s been around forever, but only recently have people embraced that in the printing industry. Mailing and information technology—we added a bit more of that.

With the way technology is changing, does this need to be revised more frequently?
I think it would be a bad idea to wait another 10 years. We will definitely be keeping on top of it a little more. I don’t know what the interval is going to be. We thought about doing it biannually, but the thought of it just makes me tired. Maybe in the next 2–3 years we’ll do an update.

Is this glossary considered the standard in the industry?
I would love to think so! I think Printing Industries of America sets standards in the industry, and people look to us for these kinds of answers. This is certainly a resource we provide. If people aren’t sure, I hope they consider the Glossary as providing answers with some authority behind them.

Do you have a favorite word or definition?
As an editor, I don’t like to play favorites when it comes to words. I don’t have too many strong preferences.