The Future Of Publishing Blog by Thad McIlroy

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September 17th, 2009

E-books Won’t Stay Ugly Forever

A subject which receives far too little coverage in the great eBook orgy is just how much is lost in the conversersion from books-on-paper to eBooks in one of the many eBook formats. What is lost: nearly every visual element, from typeface choices to page design. As this May 2009 article on Wired.com states: “Ultimately…

September 16th, 2009

The Adobe-Omniture deal: Does it Make Sense?

This is the VERY obvious title I’ve pulled from a good ZDNet blog by Larry Dignan today. Tonight I wrote to the Wall Street Journal reporters on the story (as there was no room for commenting): “My first thought was that Adobe needed to spend a bunch of that cash they’ve got lying around to…

September 15th, 2009

Will Authors of the Future Need Publishers?

A good follow-up to yesterday’s post about Daniel Menaker’s post on trade book publishing comes from Nathanial Bransford’s popular blog (81 comments so far on the entry). Titled, of course, Will Authors of the Future Need Publishers? Bransford makes several important points. 1. Book sales are off 2.5% for the year as of July, compared to…

September 14th, 2009

The Honest Truth About Trade Publishing

Those in the business recognize a distinction between trade publishing (i.e. books of general interest sold through regular retail and online outlets) versus, for example, educational publishing (books for schools and higher education). We don’t hear much about the great bestsellers in educational publishing (although I can assure you than many earn both their publishers…

September 14th, 2009

Books Face Extinction as Schools go High-Tech

Well it certainly wins the inflammatory headline of the day award. This silly article in the Boston Herald would be OK with me if it said “printed books threatened,” or something approaching that line of thought. But we are not yet referring to the woolly mammoth. Among the choice quotes: 1. ““If you look at…