Friday, March 09, 2012
Tectonic Shift
It isn't news that the publishing industry is going the way of the spinning wheel. The industry has been thrashing like music recording companies and trying to protect the value of its content. That is why this potential lawsuit is important. The DoJ is warning the industry that it cannot collude to maintain pricing. Sooner or later, prices will collapse and enter a free-market fall. The old economic model won't work. There will be too few bookstores through which to distribute and too many e-books in the hands of consumers only willing to pay a fraction of a printed text. What will the industry say then? How will it communicate its value? In fact, what value will it bring to authors and readers, especially when one can self-publish easily today? Doing PR for a publisher is a risky job now. It always is when one is on the wrong side of history.
Update: Typo corrected in the text. Thanks to an alert reader.
Update: Typo corrected in the text. Thanks to an alert reader.
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