How complicated is ISO 12647, anyway?

Printers who just finally started paying attention to tracking their densities have been a little shaken by the G7 groundswell, and feel overwhelmed by rumors of some ISO thing out there. ISO? Isn't that some European thing, like the metric system? Why do things keep changing? What happened to good old fashioned printing?

It's true that ISO 12647-2 is probably the most-talked about, longest, and least read publication (at least in the United States) since "The Name of the Rose", but boiled down to its essentials it is straightforward and familiar. Latest editions have gone colorimetric, but the original edition was all about density, dot gain.....oh, and gray balance.

To help cut through the fog, take a look at this post-it-note sized condensation of ISO 12647-2, from the original 1996 edition. It may be a golden oldie, but I'll bet it looks pretty familiar to many offset printers who never heard of the original standard.