future of publishing « Publishing Talk

Roads? Where we’re going, we don’t need roads

Rich Holman | 5:26 pm 12 May 10 Comments Off

There is a lack of skills in the publishing industry to deal with new emergent paradigms. But it’s not just skills and structure that are lacking, but culture and attitude. In a period of accelerating change we need vastly more efficient methods of developing new concepts. In this post I want to share some thoughts about some of the changes that would be required for publishers to become more agile, generalist and collaborative in an age where we are all becoming publishers, authors, creators and consumers and as such all have a voice and opinion as well as the ability to implement our own ideas.

Tags: agile, development, eBooks, print, skills —

The Future of Magazines

Jon Reed | 4:12 pm 12 Mar 10 Comments 2

Many have seen online magazines and newspapers as a threat to revenues – notably Rupert Murdoch. But what if you could create content and a user experience so compelling that people would willingly pay for it? We’re already seeing signs of this with iPhone apps. The iPad could take things a stage further. I talked about the Minority Report moment on this blog back in 2007. I also said magazines would get there before books. With the iPad, I’d say that moment is pretty much here. And the magazine will be WIRED – coming to an iPad near you this summer.

Do iPad or do I Kindle?

Tom Evans | 2:58 pm 29 Jan 10 Comments 1

Tom Evans is an author, author mentor, writer’s unblocker and e-publishing wizard. Follow his memes and musings on Twitter @thebookwright
The debate is not about which device is better than the others. It’s about authors and publishers embracing a whole new world of opportunity.

Much has been written over the last 48 hours or so about Apple’s [...]

Tags: Amazon, apple, E-book, IBook, iPad, iPhone, Kindle, sony, Sony Reader —

Tools of Change at Frankfurt Book Fair

Jon Reed | 7:25 pm 14 Oct 09 Comments Off

For those of us not at the Frankfurt Book Fair this week, it’s been easier than ever to keep up with the presentations, the deals, the gossip and the bar-hopping (er, I mean stand-hopping) with the #fbf09 hashtag.
The various blogs and Twitter accounts covering the Book Fair include @thebookseller, the ever irreverent and entertaining @missdaisyfrost, [...]

Kindle 2 and the publishing revolution

Jon Reed | 11:06 pm 24 Feb 09 Comments 4

Everyone’s talking about Kindle 2. To those outside the industry this must sound as opaque and mysterious a revolution as Vatican 2. [My only reference for that is The Thornbirds, which you can now buy as a Kindle edition].
The Kindle 2 is the next generation of Amazon’s wireless e-book reading device, and it started shipping [...]

Tools of Change 2009

Jon Reed | 8:51 pm 20 Feb 09 Comments Off

Were you at the O’Reilly Tools of Change conference in New York last week? No? Me either. If, like me, you missed out on the annual digital publishing love-in, here is your crib sheet:

download the slides from your favourite presentations
watch Chris Brogan’s presentation on Blogging and Social Media.

Enjoy!

the winter of disintermediated content

Jon Reed | 5:51 pm 02 Feb 09 Comments 2

Welcome back, dear reader, and a belated Happy New Year! Are you optimistic about this year? The news is so full of economic doom and gloom these days, I’d understand if you were feeling a bit mis. January was a long, dark month. Then today saw the start of the heaviest snowfall in the UK [...]

the end of book publishing

Jon Reed | 9:21 pm 22 Sep 08 Comments 3

Before you switch off from another doomsaying prophesy, this is actually quite an interesting article from New York Magazine:
The book business as we know it will not be living happily ever after. With sales stagnating, CEO heads rolling, big-name authors playing musical chairs, and Amazon looming as the new boogeyman, publishing might have to look [...]

who needs publishers?

Jon Reed | 9:43 pm 02 Jun 08 Comments 3

A quick heads-up for anyone who’s not yet seen Sara Lloyd’s excellent piece for US-based library journal, Library Trends, called A Book Publisher’s Manifesto for the 21st Century, on how traditional publishers need to adapt to the new media economy – something we’re always banging on about on this blog. The whole article is now [...]

the future for publishers

Jon Reed | 6:36 pm 28 Mar 08 Comments 4

More on business models and the future of publishing this week – this time from Paul Watson of The Lazarus Corporation. I love the strapline on his blog: “all that you think you know is wrong”. Always a good mantra for thinking the unthinkable, that one. Anyway, here’s his eloquent take on the failure of [...]