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Table of Contents
Introduction
The Changing Nature of Book Production
The Book (and the universe of books) Transforming
Marketplace Organization
For Future Consideration
All Resources
Introduction
The environment in which book publishing operates is increasingly competitive. Other media (television, radio and film) and other publishing forms (newspapers and magazines) compete for the attention of readers by providing information and entertainment in less intellectually demanding media. New interactive technologies make it easy for users to create content—blogs, games, wikis and multimedia, combining text, image, sound, and moving images. Yet fundamental changes are also taking place in the world of book publishing that are contributing to its evolution.
Change to book publishing is coming at a steady but manageable pace both from competitive new media and technological possibilities that extend the range of activities in which book publishers engage. Were they to embrace technological innovation, publishers could equally publish books, text documents, podcasts, images, sound or any content in digital form.
Specifically, niche publishers provide evidence that experimentation with new technological forms can be rewarding. Educational publishers are demonstrating the attractiveness of value-added content. Scholarly journal publishers are vastly expanding their audiences by publishing online. Business and technical publishers are demonstrating—by their bottom lines—the profitability of digital need-to-know information. And who knows the future of e-books?
Large companies are making significant investments, and no doubt they will find some kind of market niche. Given general low levels of profitability in the industry and resistance to change, government can certainly play a useful catalytic role in encouraging technological development in book publishing.
The Changing Nature of Book Production
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