Support the Typosphere

Good news! 

We have blown past the 5 year renewal and have secured enough money to fund the Typosphere.net domain for the next 10 or 15 years! (I have to see if we can renew for 15 years.) Thank you to everyone who helped make this possible. Typosphere.net will live on.

These kind people have donated. Mike is working on a special place to recognize what you have done.

William L.	Bill M.
Gordon T.	Peter W.
Richard P.	Stephanie L. W.
Sheila C.	Laura B.
Daniel J.	Martha L.
Rodja R. P.	Mike C.
Rob B.	Gabriel B.
Loom Web Design	Greek Drama Media
N.J. H.	Sylvia D.
Steven K.	Natalie T.

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Hello Typospherians. I am reaching out to you for help.

Typosphere.net net is the front page of the typewriter internet. It's been the place to post type-in notices, share stories about typewriters in the news, review new typewriter books, and present the typewriter-loving world. Now, Typosphere.net needs your help.

The Typosphere.net domain name needs to be renewed and I would love to get it registered for the next five years. The cost to do that would be $100. If everyone who has loved and supported this great site could chip in a few clams we could get this domain locked down for the next half-decade.

Your support means everyone can keep posting type-in updates, typewriters in the news, book reviews, and launches for the next five years. If you are interested in helping you can follow this link to my Paypal.me link. I will keep a detailed record of who donates and make sure that you get special recognition.

Please consider helping raise the money for this small goal.

Thanks,
Ryan
(http://www.magicmargin.net)

Typosphere.net Search Term Extravaganza

A highly-infrequent and generally snarky look at the search terms that bring people in to the Typosphere site, with attempts at responding to the questions therein:

adjusting typeface typewriter remington

Your first step is to try and determine what model Remington you have. There's likely someone else around who has the same model, or a similar one, and maybe has even done this sort of thing. Did you check the repairs topics here on the site? You're probably looking at adjusting a screw or pair of screws on the mechanism that move up and down. Some typewriters have cushioning material that may have gotten pulverized over the years and needs to be replaced. Back in the days of regular typewriter repair shops, this was probably an easier prospect than it is today.

I suspect that a clever owner could pick up a set of felt washers from the plumbing section of the hardware store and cut a small slit in them from the inner circle to the outside edge, to allow them to be slipped over the shifting rods without any additional disassembly. Actual implementation is left as an exercise to the reader.

are ipods obsolete

Yes! But that's not Apple's fault, necessarily. Blame the march of technological advances, the ease and cheapness of overseas mass assembly, and the drive to always own better/faster/newer. iPods and most other modern devices are obsolete before their release, if you consider that their replacements are already being designed and mapped out. Gone are the days of a "lifetime" device affordable by the average person. You might as well buy a typewriter: it's already obsolete, it will outlive you, and you can share your music with everyone in the room... whether they like it or not. Not since the heyday of the boom box has it been so easy to share!

In all seriousness, though, consider what you really want and what you really need, and buy accordingly. My 1st generation iPod shuffle is lightweight and easily holds enough songs to keep me entertained while walking the dog. And consider whether a single-purpose all-in-one device is worth it to you. I don't have to take my phone with me on dog walks.

define typewriter by four authors.

There's certainly no shortage of typewriter books out there. I personally recommend The Story of My Typewriter by Paul Auster, which is a fairly personal expression of one author's writing machine. I doubt that Mr. Auster feels as strongly about his iPod, if he owns such a thing.

imperial b typewriter ribbon vibrater

 "Vibrator" is the correct spelling: it's the little part that lifts the ribbon up in front of the type bars as you work, and then yanks it out of the way again so you can see.

I just looked up photos of the Imperial B, and I have to say: if you own one of these, it's a lovely machine. Most vibrator problems I've found tend to be from accumulated ink and the grime of time. The Imperial B is a real antique, so be very careful slopping around cleaning fluids and the like. A cotton swab with some mild solvent -- maybe white vinegar? -- might be a good first step. Go slow, and bend nothing.

ink and bean

The name of the cafe that got put on a lot of Typospherians' bucket lists for sure, mine included.

international typewriter day

June 23rd, by popular decree,  although International Typewriter Appreciation Month (ITAM) is coming in February. Hug a typewriter all month!

i put new ribbon on old spools for vintage royal typer but it will only wind lef to right why

Offhand, I'd say you've got them backwards. On most of my portables, the ribbon unspools from the "back" of the spool, as seen by the typist. On my Royal standard, though, they unwind from the front. I have an Underwood portable that does the same thing.

Make sure the ribbon isn't jammed up, and if the typewriter has a ribbon-reverse switch, flip it and see if you can get the spools to turn the other direction. If not, try setting up the spools so they wind/unwind differently. To own a typewriter often means solving a series of puzzles.

manual typewriter rental

For what purpose? If its for a theater prop, there might be some collectors who have suitable machines that can withstand the ill-treatment that a life in the limelight presents. For movies, I would assume your prop house can manage something, though I know some collectors have also loaned or sold era-appropriate models to productions.

repair a olympia corona typewriter

Step 1: figure out if it's an Olympia, or a Corona. If it's both, you may have larger issues than you think.

royal mercury 1939 typewriter

Pretty! If you're buying one on an online auction, make sure the photos are of the actual machine being sold, though. More than a few 'spherians have seen their photos used for fake online auctions.

steve soboroff typewriter collection

Jealousy-inducing. Steve collects celebrity machines -- that is, the machines of and used by celebrities, though I suppose the machines have a fame unto themselves, after a fashion. Their durability can lead to a lifetime of deeds, both infamous and notorious.

typewriter blog

Look over there, on your right. That sea of links? Blogs a-plenty. If you have one, post a link! We'll be happy to add you in.

typewriter dirk plante

Here he is.

typewriter hunter thompson

Here he is. That's a Selectric being threatened.

typosphere
welcome to the typosphere

You found us!

Post Typewriter Repair Links Here

I'm going to go ahead and get started gathering information, as it is never too early to do so. We are definitely going to have to set up a day and time to run a Google Hangout, or set up a forum of some kind, to work out what to do after the information is gathered and set up in a primitive webpage. It's imperative to archive each submission as links and blogs aren't permanent, and I will be doing that as they are submitted. I also had some basic ideas for tagging the submissions by manufacturer, model, and repair type.

Scour your own blogs/sites for repairs! If each of us does a fraction of the work, it will be simpler for me (!) and progress faster. If you don't have much time to do so, just including the link will be fine. If you have more time, also include a little about the submission, as in this example:

http://phlsphthght.blogspot.com/2013/06/mystery-solved-frozen-facit-starring.html (plain text link)
Fixing frozen carriage and ribbon advance with a solvent (repair/adjustment description)
Facit TP2, Facit 1620 (if machine specific, manufacturer and models)

Outline for the Typewriter Repair Resource

There is a weakness to forming the project over blog posts, as Rob mentioned. It's not as easy to be collaborative here, but we'll try our best. It's a simple enough project.

Will pointed out that this is an attempt to preserve repair knowledge, which it is exactly. I just couldn't find the right words. We have a tremendous amount of information that is exponentially growing, but it lacks good organisation. When a body of knowledge grows quickly, without being consolidated, organised, and maintained, that knowledge has the potential to be lost!

One of the goals of the typosphere is to preserve not only typewriters, but all the knowledge that must accompany them. Why must we do this? Because these machines deserve it! They have lasted this long and will continue to fulfill their original purpose for decades. Try saying that about the MITS Altair 8800. Wait...that didn't really have any useful purpose other than to show that working microcomputers could be built by hobbyists. A better example would be the Apple II. If you were an Apple user in 1980, your computing needs were met with that product. Today an Apple II would be largely useless in fulfilling the computing needs a user demands (whether it was an excellent product or not).

There will be a time in the future when there is nobody left who has grown up around manual typewriters and learnt from the experts about repairing them. That legacy is already disappearing, but it is being replaced with something with the potential to become even greater. The majority of typewriter users now are enthusiasts, and also their own repairperson. Knowledge is freely shared amongst, as it should be.

The idea of a wiki has been brought up, originally last year by Shordzi, and now again. I was on a bit of a typosphere hiatus at the time, so I can't say from experience—but I can imagine that didn't take off because there was not a solid base of organised information from which to create the wiki, and there weren't enough people with the time or inclination to develop it. I'm not advocating re-starting that idea yet—rather, we should keep this as simple as possible. Once the pieces have been gathered together, then a wiki can naturally spring forth from that information base with all the focus on re-organising it into wiki format, rather than having to worry about information gathering.

Ted mentioned the Typewriter Database as a candidate to host and arrange the links. It would be best to get the information sorted separately first, in case the wiki idea is later pursued, saving him hours of work on the website that could be eclipsed within the fairly near future. If the wiki shows no signs of interest, then that might be considered!

There are two possible suggested ways of organising the repair information—by brand and model, or by repair type and subtype. Both have their merits. When I first conceived this project, the main types of repairs I had in mind were the common Olympia carriage problems and the frozen Facits—very machine-specific knowledge. Mike had in mind over-arching repairs like platen replacement and character alignment adjustment. These are less machine-specific operations that can be more easily applied to a wider range.

It would probably be best to arrange the repairs using both methods. Most repairs could be grouped by typewriter. A separate section could group them by repair type. There would be much overlap, but some of the links would be present in only one section. The actual format of the repair entries will include a short description of the problem, and how it is addressed, as well as the link.

I propose that as long as there are no other major suggestions, as it seems best to keep this as simple as possible to begin with, we should spread the word and individually link to our repairs in the comments. I'll wait a day or two for any further discussion, and then create another post to collect the repair links! 

One last thing. We need a better name than the long-winded "Centralised Typewriter Repair Resource", Something concise and meaningful. Of course we could just call the page "Repairing Typewriters".

Creating a Centralised Typewriter Repair Resource

Collectively, the typosphere has made great progress in solving many of the age- and repair-related complications plaguing our typewriters, finding out that major problems often have simple solutions. These fixes often are not specific to the one typewriter that has been fixed, but apply to all within that model range. It's about time we set up a way to keep these repairs organised by brand and model in a central location!

Imagine this: you've discovered a beautiful Olympia SM3 with a fantastic typeface, but it is plagued with a carriage problem that you don't know how to repair. Maybe you've seen someone post on it before and can't remember where or when. Perhaps somebody has solved this problem, but you just don't know about it. You could Google it, and you might find what you're after. Suddenly you remember! (How could you have ever forgotten?) You look up "Olympia SM" on the Typosphere's repair page and scroll to the "carriage" section.  After checking out the linked blog posts, an hour later your SM3 is functioning perfectly.

My first thought was to create a page on this blog, listing typewriters alphabetically by manufacturer, then chronologically by model. Underneath each section would be links to various helpful repair blog posts. (As well as a separate area for fixes that apply to multiple typewriters.) That is my suggestion. Let's hear yours!

After it is decided, I'll make another post where you can submit your own repair posts for inclusion. For now let's just focus on how to best host and arrange them.

—N Beland / Philosophothought

Two Weeks to Go Time

November is just under two weeks away. Have you thrown your hat into the Typewriter Brigade ring? Consider using a typewriter for your draft this year, so you don't get trampled by this guy:

Typosphere going Germany

An article featuring the typosphere and yours truly in the Frankfurter Allgemeine Sonntagszeitung of 16 Oct. 2011, p. 51. Hopefully this will bring some more German speakers to join our club. (click to enlarge). reporting from Switzerland, shordzi