As a former intern at Lulu I'm very happy to see a post on HN about it. Lulu has come a very long way, in many aspects, but specifically in print quality. The UX department while I was there was way more into testing users, and working long hours trying to be as usable as possible than I would have ever have expected.
As a former user of Lulu, I'm very happy to hear about the improvements in print quality and can now move Lulu from "Oh hell no, never again" status to "viable alternative next time Blurb wants to charge me $80 for a 50 page book."
What exactly were your problems with Lulu? I have been meaning to get a hard copy of Creative Commons licensed math textbook made and was considering using Lulu. Is it okay for printing technical books?
The time I used it (which I think was right after they launched) the paper was incredibly low quality and the print quality was lacking compared to what I'd consider most laser printers capable of. This was for novel-type text. This was also something like 7 or 8 years ago. I'm sure they've improved by now!
Likewise, as a former Lulu employee, I'm happy to see them getting positive mentions. They aren't perfect and their offerings have warts (like everybody) but by and large, they have a very nice offering.
Comments
As a former intern at Lulu I'm very happy to see a post on HN about it. Lulu has come a very long way, in many aspects, but specifically in print quality. The UX department while I was there was way more into testing users, and working long hours trying to be as usable as possible than I would have ever have expected.
As a former user of Lulu, I'm very happy to hear about the improvements in print quality and can now move Lulu from "Oh hell no, never again" status to "viable alternative next time Blurb wants to charge me $80 for a 50 page book."
What exactly were your problems with Lulu? I have been meaning to get a hard copy of Creative Commons licensed math textbook made and was considering using Lulu. Is it okay for printing technical books?
The time I used it (which I think was right after they launched) the paper was incredibly low quality and the print quality was lacking compared to what I'd consider most laser printers capable of. This was for novel-type text. This was also something like 7 or 8 years ago. I'm sure they've improved by now!
Likewise, as a former Lulu employee, I'm happy to see them getting positive mentions. They aren't perfect and their offerings have warts (like everybody) but by and large, they have a very nice offering.