Printing and imprinting is something Scott understood very well. Capturing the song in 10 second visually-printed snippets must not have been too difficult, once he figured it out. The problem was he didn’t know how to play back what he’d recorded!

He printed all of the “grooves”, using his phonautograph on rag paper,  but no phonautograph-reader has been found.

So modern-day scientists had to cook up a way to sight-read the recordings, to what I think are pretty nifty (and spooky) sounding results.

This scenario doesn’t sound too different from today as people in the music, movie, book, web and mobile fields are crossing lines, mashing up tools and pushing boundaries to make new books and products. I just think it’s neat that the first audio recording ever made was actually printed on paper.

No doubt it’s going to get crowded fast. But it’s a great idea.

There are also two new FREE iOS apps for font and type geeks:

Fontli, has an Instagram-feel, and is trying to build a social network around fonts. The idea being that you could submit a snap shot of some type and your virtual rolodex of font-ish friends could help you identify it. Also, there is…

Fontmaker, which lets you create your own font variations to use in text messaging and emails sent from your mobile device. Not super-useful, but I could see where some would get a kick out of throwing in some random ligatures and letter forms.

Heather Lins’ A Year in Caps

This one is $32 and is printed on 12 different wooden cards. Each screen-printed with colorful inks and starkly different fonts.

365 Typography Calendar

This one has been around for over a decade (it’s been known as Pentagram’s calendar) and the designers are branching out with this one. The 2012 edition is comprised of original fonts that are not for sale anywhere. The fonts were designed by contemporary designers who used landmarks, technology and pop culture as inspiration. This is sold in two sizes for $35 and $55.

Harald Geisler’s Typographic Wall Calendar

This one is by far my favorite. Geisler successfully ran a Kickstarter campaign to push his calendar into production. His calendar is massive as he used 2012 computer keys to list out every day of the year. No doubt this one would be one heck of a conversation piece. It’s pretty fun. There are various prices. A single calendar runs for $35 (including shipping). Prices go up if you want signed copies or the actual keyboard keys. It’s worth watching the video just to get an idea of the artist and how the calendar is laid out.

Here’s the site where you can check out all the wall coverings. Just click on the ‘Life’ drop down. There is also a drop down to select the language. Setting it to English is helpful. It’s doubtful that we’ll get any of these exact typographic wallpaper designs, but I certainly have some cool ideas now.

But this one has to be my favorite so far. It’s almost a work of art. This wall calendar is only $10 and displays the entire year on the front, thanks to the cool circular type design. Sure this isn’t one that you could log appointments on, but it sure would look nice on the wall.

Did I miss any other cool calendars this year?

Thursday, June 25th at Bottletree Cafe, Jim Sherraden will be there to show off and talk about letterpress, art and the Nashville shop that’s been in business since 1879.

The event is slated to run from 6p-8p. See you there!