Printers have defined the modern era. In early Europe as well as earlier China printers allowed ideas and civilization to spread and grow like never before. Religion, military, culture—all were transferred in text and spurred the growth of a reading class, which rapidly became the foundation for the modern middle class. In the hundreds of years since the Wittenberg Bible and rapidly printed distributed tracts we have seen enough books published to fill massive archives, we have seen new languages arise and fall, information and technology grow wings and spread like wildfire. Writers have replaced scribes just as now computers seem to be replacing ink and paper, yet companies, schools, and libraries yet consume huge amounts of ink and paper every day. If the creation of the printing press laid the foundation for the modern age, the arrival of the personal computer and the personal printer brought it home.
These technologies have created numerous markets and industries, and each of those has created more, often by accident. Such is the case with personal printing. Today there are a dozen large corporations operating, producing numerous lines of printers for numerous purposes in a fiercely competitive global market, each printer also creating its own market as specific printer cartridges are produced and replaced numerous times in the life of the printer itself. Aftermarkets are then created where third party companies copy or remanufacture these Epson, Lexmark, Brother, HP, and Canon ink and toner packs, passing them off for far less as each side and each company decries the competition, praises their own work, and invests hugely in new innovations to secure a larger share for the future. The scope of the field is dizzying.
But no less impressive than the journey of each particular company. Today Canon is one of the leaders in personal consumer electronics and has fought hard to get where it is. Originally named for the Buddhist goddess of Mercy Kwanon in 1934 the company changed to a more western-friendly title a dozen years later, operating by producing high quality cameras and founding the Precision Optical Instruments Laboratory for research and development throughout the Second World War. Relying heavily on camera manufacture and design throughout the century the company did find time to expand its product base, notably with the canola 150, a personal calculator which involved huge technological advances over the leading British system of the time, TV camera lenses, and zoom lenses which vastly improved the range and quality of the personal camera.
By the 1970s cannon introduced the world’s very first inkjet printer, the very same technology millions of families and businesses rely on daily for small to medium printing tasks, the same technology that you may well have needed to buy Canon MP560 ink cartridges for. This advance, which literally uses tiny tiny nozzles and a computer generated pattern to fire droplets at the paper in repeated lines as it moves up, is now used by ever single other consumer printing company including Epson ink, Dell Ink, Lexmark, Hp, Brother, Okidata—you name it.
By its 50th anniversary Canon was a commanding figure in the Camera, Camcorder, Printer, scanner, and various other personal electronics fields, currently receiving literally thousands of patents a year in the United States today, usually placing in the top five receiving companies as far as number.
Also distinguishing, Canon has been a tremendous sponsor of both global and national events the world over. While a full list of events would be too long to list, Canon has recently sponsored numerous football evens (soccer for Americans) including multiple World Cups and Championship Leagues. Canon has also been a major sponsor of the Red Cross, donating both funding and equipment to medical stations the world over. When in the 2000s large earthquakes dislocated several million Chinese citizens various arms of the company, even the Japanese branch (a country with lingering bad blood with Chinese since the Second World War), donated millions through various outlets to help. The World Wildlife Foundation also enjoys significant support from the corporation. Tennis and golf, in the United States, are commonly sponsored by the entity for publicity purposes.
As far as buying a Canon printer goes, they are extremely common to find in most major department stores or tech outlets. Canon cameras are also highly convenient when paired with these printers as you can often generate shortcuts between the two, using your camera’s memory card to plug directly into the printer. Always check review sites before you make your purchase and investigate in the relative printing cost of all your options, as always.