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The following is a tale told by Ken Burnside of Ad Astra Games in this Bluesky thread. It is faithfully preserved here because this shit is too good to live exclusively on social media. If you found this story organically you are obligated to buy a game from Ken or at least buy him a beer the next time you see him.

Ad Astra Games learned about in-house Print-on-Demand publishing from Timeline Ltd's new owners when they reprinted The Morrow Project. I knew of a new kind of laser printer with lower costs-per-click. We shared what we knew with Amarillo Design Bureau, who adopted the process post-haste. Steve Cole had to claim ADB didn't copy our process—in spite of buying identical equipment less than a month after we sent him the brands and sales agents...

We spent 7 grand in 2005 money on equipment, then spent 2K on a finisher when center-stapling booklets was a job nobody wanted to do. Why did we spend 9 grand on a printer?

Because the quotes we had for three upcoming projects, combined, would've been 8 grand, and would've involved storing 3,000 copy print runs of products in Scott Palter's spare bedroom until they generated revenue.

How does this touch on Ken Whitman? Well...

In 2005. I give a seminar on this technology at GAMA Trade Show (the old name of GAMA Expo). Marcus King and Ken Whitman are sitting in the audience as I explain the benefits. Steve Cole is also in the audience and nodding along. (ADB had already adopted this process by then.)

But basically, by buying the equipment we did, you could make soft-cover RPG books with black-and-white interiors of good enough quality to sell through distribution (think of pre-2004 GURPS supplements) at a price that didn't cost you money.

The d20 glut was raging then...

By 2006, Ken Whitman had somehow lined up the funding to get the higher end version of this equipment; it had to have been a lease. This was four blocky things the size of dishwashers that linked like LEGOs that could take two files (cover and interior) and spit out perfect-bound books.

Ken's business model was to go to conventions and print your RPG book while you waited and hand it to you hot off the press. No inventory, just load the equipment up on the moving truck he already owned, pay for electricity at the convention, buy paper in bulk from a distributor to cut costs.

For all of Ken's myriad faults, he has exactly the level of technical expertise to wheel the four-part gigantic printing and binding machines together. He set this up at Origins 2006, and it kinda-sorta worked. He ran into a problem that people who buy books want to see the books before they buy. He packed the machinery and paper up on the truck and drove it to a parking lot halfway between Columbus and Indianapolis, where one of Marcus King's employees was waiting to drive him home.

This means his business critical equipment is sitting in a locked truck. In another state.

In the 6 weeks between Origins and GenCon, he's taking book orders off of his website, and 'hustling' to line up more publishers for Convention Print On Demand. And his goal is to get to GenCon, print his backlog, ship them, bring his laptop with the updated files and have More Books to Sell.

Gather 'round, because this is where it gets *good*.

He's got two of those printing plants; this is about $400k of hardware. It's in a locked second-hand U-Haul truck. You know how some U-Haul trucks have a milky white skylight over the "above the cab" part of the back?

Ken's had that.

A squirrel managed to get through that skylight. And discovered 8 washing-machine sized parts of an expensive printing plant. And several dozen boxes of paper. This was a great place to have squirrel babies, store nuts, make nests, and nobody can eat you or your babies!

After being opened by squirrels, the skylight was no longer water-tight.

There was a gigantic rainstorm the weekend before GenCon.

Ken got driven out to where his locked truck was, saw that the lock was untouched, and never opened the back of the truck before driving to Indianapolis. Ken gets to the Indianapolis Convention Center late on Monday, goes and hangs out with the very early GenCon crews from the very big publishers. (And by 'hang out' I generally assume 'be in the same space with people who are actively avoiding him').

Tuesday morning comes. Ken takes his second-hand U-Haul to the marshaling area. Which isn't open yet. He waits. He waits longer. He's sitting in an un-airconditioned cab in August in Indianapolis. He gets out, he tries to find someone who can let him get to the freight area of the ICC. A day earlier than anyone else.

Around 3 PM, he gets told to get out of the marshaling yard, and to come back no earlier than 5 AM on Wednesday. He drives out, goes to his very offsite hotel and sleeps.

He still hasn't opened the back of that truck.

It rains _again_ overnight. He also oversleeps.

We got to GenCon and got an early slot on the marshaling lot, and moved all of our booth stuff in and were setting it up. We took a short break. Ken Whitman backs his U-Haul up to the freight docks, with all the freight doors wide open. It's about 1 PM, it's hot, it's sticky. Nobody's happy.

The vendor's hall for GenCon is a series of concrete floored ballrooms, and they don't run air conditioning on load-in from the freight docks. It's a muggy August day. A bunch of middle aged dorks are moving heavy pallets of books in a humid concrete box and setting up displays. We happened to have a clear line of sight from our booth as Ken finally opens the back of the truck.

Three things happen.

First, a flood of water comes over the lip of the back of the truck, splashing over Ken's feet in his shorts.

Second, Ken starts shouting "Fuck, fuck, fuck..."

Third, squirrels, unable to climb out of the truck since Ohio, scrambled out onto the freight dock and scattered for any place they could hide in the concrete jungle of the Indiana Convention Center. They came charging IN at first, saw people moving and dashed the crawlspaces of the airwalls.

Ken pleaded for people to help him unload his truck. Nobody did. He used his pallet jack to unload the truck, but has to manually stack cartons of soggy paper, since it wasn't palletized. He gets yelled at by ICC staff for taking far too long unloading his truck.

Eventually, he gets it unloaded, and then leaves his stuff at his booth while he goes and moves his truck to where it'll be the entire con. He returns...with mournful desperation...assembles both of his printing stations. He opens the paper drawers. There's standing water in them. And squirrel scat.

And we hear Ken say "Fuck, fuck, fuck, fuck...."

Lots of people hear this; it's a concrete box, Ken has become the Schadenfreude Entertainer of the Hour. Then Ken discovers the electrical hasn't been hooked up, and trudges over to Geo Fern to get it turned on. There's an argument of some sort. Ken goes to the Titan Games booth and pleads with Marcus King, they go back to Geo Fern and I presume Marcus pays for Ken's electrical hookup.

While this is happening, some squirrels with babies come out of his waterlogged paper supply, see way too many people and bolt, trying to find any way out.

Ken comes back, plugs in his two printing stations, and runs a diagnostic. Friend, if I told you that very high end dye sublimation printers with lots of onboard electronics don't like having water damage and squirrels living in them, would you be surprised?

Ken Whitman apparently was.

Ken Whitman pulls out his cell phone and calls his service rep. In Michigan. Who rightfully says "We don't make service calls out of state, but let me see if we can find another vendor in Indianapolis..." Ken is mordantly unhappy. And desperate. His service rep finds an Indianapolis vendor.

So, these service techs have manuals for the printer models they service. Service tech shows up on Thursday morning at 8 AM. Dealer's hall opens at 10 AM. Ken somehow manages to convince GenCon to let the service tech in two hours early.

He's still there when the rest of us are allowed in at 9 AM. Ken is arguing with the service tech. Both "head ends" of his printing stations are open and partially disassembled. The service tech is at a loss for words. He doesn't have the parts to fix this, he's not sure it *can* be fixed, and is gobsmacked at this entire mess.

Ken is threatening to sue.

The service tech, who doesn't work for the company providing Ken's contract, and is out here as an intra-company emergency favor, just looks at him, packs up his tools and cases, walks over to an ICC staffer so they can escort him from the vendor hall, and leaves.

Through the rest of the convention, Ken sits in his booth on a stool, next to two $200k printers that are totaled, surrounded by cartons of waterlogged and squirrel-chewed paper, with tables full of his promotional materials. He can't even load up his truck to leave before Sunday.

Meanwhile, the squirrels have taken to staying in the airwall gaps and coming out at night to forage for food. We (and several other vendors) discover that squirrels will chew books. So all books go back in boxes at night, inconveniencing everyone else in the hall.

I have no idea how Ken survived that financial debacle.

Remember, he had an outstanding backlog of books to print at the show and ship from the gap between Origins and GenCon. Plus the cost of the booth. Plus the cost of electricity. Plus the financial hit of his leased printers being waterlogged.