The Printing Department was far too small now. It could not keep cramped up in the school forever. The Han Tribe had more and more books, and its population was growing as well. The number of schools would rapidly increase in the future, too. All these circumstances pointed to one thing: the Printing Department was gradually unable to meet demand.
Industrial upgrading, organizational upgrading, tool upgrading, and expansion—all of these were urgent matters. Therefore, Luo Chong decided to have Bai Qi and the others produce the Hand-cranked Roller Duplicator and Chinese Character Typewriter first. Then, when he moved south with his entire household, he would bring them along and establish a National Publishing House in the capital to handle the publication and printing of all kinds of books and periodicals.
If the technology matured, setting up a newspaper office in the future would be no problem either. However, building a newspaper office required more than adequate printing technology. Paper manufacturing also had to undergo industrial transformation. Processes such as manually scooping, drying, and calendering paper would all have to be replaced by industrial methods in the future.
Besides, the paper produced could no longer come in individual sheets, because that kind of paper was unsuitable for industrial printing. Only paper made in rolls could be continuously fed into a newspaper printing assembly line.
Luo Chong was making plans for the southward migration in his study at home, recording every matter in his personal memorandum. Aside from moving the paper-making facilities and Printing Department south together, he also planned to bring along the manpower and machinery required by southern industry. Thus, over the next two months, he would have to go to Big Strength and Lin Fei in Xingang Commandery and urge them to move faster. Without affecting their production, finding