Cover design requested

["Brierley, Sean" <Sean -at- Quodata -dot- Com>]

Hallo: 
I need some design feedback.
Today, I was forced to throw together a cover page for a 100-page book. The
cover must look good in PDF and print. The book is printed on 3-hole punch
paper and bound in a 3-ring binder. The cover would be the first page inside
that binder.
(If I had the opportunity to do 4-color with spots and bleeds and graphic
art . . . but I didn't  . . . so the design had to consider the output and
be somewhat attractive, more than anything else. Oh, and I had to design it
in an hour and I'm a tech writer. <vbg>)
So the question:
On the left edge of the cover I put a GIF of some text. The text says
"Quodata Education" and is rotated 90-degrees counter-clockwise
(anti-clockwise <g>), so the text is parallel to the spine. My inclination
was to rotate the text such that you read it as it rises, so the bottom of
the text is towards the center of the page and the top of the text towards
the spine of the book.
Here it is: http://www.pubsink.com/Cover1.pdf .
As an alternative, I spun the image around, so that the baseline is adjacent
to the spine of the book and the top of the text is towards the center of
the page. Here it is: http://www.pubsink.com/Cover2.pdf .
Which is better and why? Better = looks better and/or reads better and/or
feels better, etc. 
In other words, on which side should I put the baseline and why? My strong
inclination is Cover1, with the baseline towards the center of the page.
However, a couple of folks here have balked at that orientation and feel the
baseline should be towards the spine.
Youse guys are much more qualified than any of my co-workers to comment, so
do you have any preferences? Thoughts?
Sean
sean -at- quodata -dot- com