Merrian Webster defines Publishing as: “The business or profession of the commercial production and issuance of literature, information, musical scores or sometimes recordings, or art.” This essay will review publishing from its beginnings in the 16th century, describe how technology in the 21st century has disrupted the profession of publishing. This paper will also discuss where we are today and the trajectory of the industry for the next decade.
As publishing itself is a vast universe encompassing literary books, fiction, non-fiction books, newspapers, magazines, journals, periodicals, music, art, movie scripts, plays, software, blogs, etc. both in print and electronic. This essay will be limited to the discussion of literary books, fiction and non-fiction. We will not spend much time discussing the history of books, however it is proper to quickly mention that the history of books dates back about 5,000 years when ancient Egyptians would write on a plant that grew along the Nile River called Papyrus. Papyrus sheets were glued together to form a scroll. The Codex as a form of book can be dated back to the end of the first century but it gained popularity in the Christian community in the 3rd and 4th centuries . This format of books was more economical, as both sides of the writing material could be used, it was portable, searchable and easy to conceal. Manuscript books began to supplant scrolls in Antiquity. Until the late middle ages, the great majority of books were written in monasteries by scribes, who had high social status. For this reason, the great majority of books in the Western world are of religious content. The introduction of the printing press in 1455 was a disruptive technology that brought with it an explosi...
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Wikipedia website: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_the_book
New: Book Sales Statistics (including E-Books) website: http://www.publishers.org/main/PressCenter/Archicves.htm
Press Center Website: http://www.google.com/press/pressrel/print_library.html
New: Book Sales Statistics (including E-Books) website: http://www.publishers.org/main/PressCenter/Archicves/2010_Oct/AugustStatsPressRelease.htm
Wikipedia website: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_the_ebook
Forbes.com magazine article: knowledge@Wharton Electronic textbooks? You bet
McGraw-Hill introduce new custom publishing platform: Create website:
http://www.the-digital-reader.com/2010/10/11/mcgraw-hill-introduce-new-custom-publishing-platform-create/
Business week: Amazon E-Book Market Share to Fall as Industry Grows (Update2)
February 16, 2010, 4:17 PM EST
Books today are everywhere. We find them in many households, libraries and schools all around the globe. We find many different types of books; from stories to educational textbooks, we regard them today as sources of knowledge and amusement. But it wasn’t the case before 1455. That year, one of the greatest inventions in human history was revealed to the world; Gutenberg’s printing press. This press allowed printing in massive quantity, spreading books all around Europe and the rest of the world at a fast rate. The printing press had many positive consequences on society. At first, it standardized grammar and spelling, and then introduced the mass production of books. It finally inspired future printing technologies around the world.
Schlossberg, Tatiana. “The State of Publishing: Literacy Rates”. 2 February 2011. Timothy McSweeney’s Internet Tendency. Web. 21 September 2013. :
Before the invention of the printing press, any writing done, whether it was a book, or drawing, or copies of the Bible had to be completed painstakingly by the hand. Every letter, every word, every sentence, had to be written down by hand. It took almost over an entire year to write a single book. In addition to the large amount of time spent, people often made mistakes delaying the publishing of the book. The effects of these scarce, handwritten copies were that education and learning was very limited. Desperate for fame and money, German Johannes Gutenberg changed all of that. In 1450, Gutenberg created the first ever printing press, built and improved existing printing methods. Soon, by the 1500’s printing shops were located everywhere in the major cities of Europe. People had a better way of spreading ideas and findings of new lands during the Age of Exploration, the period of time when Europeans began exploring the world by sea in search of new discoveries, trade routes, and goods found in other countries. The Age of Exploration was affected by the printing press more than the Protestant Reformation was, because it helped publicize recent findings, inspiring and
At its beginnings, the internet crafted a new but familiar form of manufacturing: the mass production of digital texts. In fact, in 1440 Gutenberg first originated the idea of mass production of texts with his invention of the Printing Press. For the first time, an automated process was able to replicate script. This new technology was not without its shortcomings. First, the printing press used limited materials. Next, as Mumford notes, the advent of print led calligraphers and manuscript copyists out of work. Furthermore, as Graff finds, it created “typographical fixity”—material once printed cannot be changed. Finally, mass production was dependent and limited to large markets (Mumf...
This article, “Why Are Textbooks So Expensive?” by Henry Roediger reveals the truth of why textbooks are so pricey. He shows how textbooks prices are costly not because of inflation, corporate textbook companies, and frequent revisions, but because of the sale of used textbooks. The article is elaborating on why used textbooks are the real culprit as well. One main point that is highlighted is that used textbooks are resold for many years. The initial selling of the textbook is the only time the author will make a profit, but the bookstore will make a profit every time they resell a used book. It is essential for the author to raise the price to compensate for the loss of money when dealing with used textbooks.
Ask any college student to state one of their largest expenses and it would be safe to bet the response would be “Textbook prices!” The cost of purchasing required materials for courses has reached numbers high enough to cause many students to take out second loans. Information released this year by the American Enterprise Institute shows that “College textbook prices have increased faster than tuition, health care costs and housing prices, all of which have risen faster than inflation” (Kingkade, 2013). This information equates to an 812% increase in the cost of college textbooks over what they were just over thirty years ago (Kingkade, 2013). The figure here shows an unusually large increase that has far outpaced that of average inflation. Combine this information with the equally troubling information released by Bloomberg stating “college tuition and fees have increased 1,120 percent since records began in 1978” and a serious financial problem for students emerges(Huffington Post, 2012). One thing should be clear given these statistics: something must be done to help lessen the financial burden being placed on today’s students. Considering the implications of these two figures, the University of Delaware should attempt to remedy the increasing cost of textbooks as soon as possible before they overwhelm students any more than they already have. In order to help reduce these runaway costs, this institution should pursue a policy similar to those high schools and elementary schools practice, namely a sort of loan program.
The History of the Book and the Idea of Literature 121 (2006): 200-213. PMLA. Web. 20
Bradbury attacks loss of literature in the society of Fahrenheit 451 to warn our current society about how literature is disappearing and the effects on the people are negative. While Montag is at Faber’s house, Faber explains why books are so important by saying, “Do you know why books such as this are so important? Because they have quality. And what does the word quality mean? To me it means texture. This book has pores” (79). Faber is trying to display the importance of books and how without them people lack quality information. In Electronics and the Decline of Books by Eli Noam it is predicted that “books will become secondary tools in academia, usurped by electronic media” and the only reason books will be purchased will be for leisure, but even that will diminish due to electronic readers. Books are significant because they are able to be passed down through generation. While online things are not concrete, you can not physically hold the words. Reading boost creativity and imagination and that could be lost by shifting to qui...
Music Business Music Business Exam Number One Question 1 - What is The music publishing industry at a glance would seem to be those who print sheet music, method books, lead sheets, and all of the texts or notated music that musicians (and those aspiring to be musicians) use. Years ago, this was what most music publishers did, but as the industry has evolved, the process has become much more complex. Music is not just ink and paper, intellectual material and property to the individual who writes it. Therefore, the song does not become "a song" when it is written down. This is not an easy concept to grasp because the song itself has no physical makeup.
In 1476, William Caxton introduced England to the printing press. This significant introduction to one of the world’s greatest technological innovations, at the time, helped to increase the spread of literacy and knowledge amongst the British people as the mass production of books became cheaper and more commonly available. According to Mastin (2011), the first book ever printed, although Caxton’s own interpretation was ‘The Recuyell of the Historyes of Troye’ in 1473. Furthermore, Mastin (2011) states that in the following 150 years after the introduction of printing, up to 20000 books were printed.
Baron, Dennis. “From Pencils to Pixels: The Stages of Literary Technologies.” Writing Material. Ed. Evelyn Tribble. New York. 2003. 35- 52.
Once upon a time, if someone wanted their ideas to be seen in writing, they had to go through the long, tenuous process of publishing, which cost a good deal of time and money, and was a gamble at all points in the process. Today, however, individuals can instead choose to self publish their works through the World Wide Web, allowing for minimal work to exposure time lapse, and a more one-on-one approach to reading.
Many countries made individual laws and practices about copyright and printing books. One practice came from the Stationers Company3, based in the City of London, who in the mid 16th century established a rule amongst themselves that they would not print any books that had already been printed. However this agreement did not pertain to ...
Printed books have a 600 year history, they are an embodiment of culture. Many book lovers tend to enjoy how books look on a shelf in their home. Like many forms of physical media like books and vinyl, people tend to buy original first print copies for their collections. First pressings of books tend to be very rare and expensive, books are an important part of history and collecting old pieces of literature is very important to some people. “Traditionally a book is either seen as an isolated singular phenomenon, a copy with all its physical dimensions attached to a single descriptive level, or embedded in a large context, a life, a library, an edition or culture.”
Literature has changed over time. “The “death of print” has been much heralded over the past decade, precipitated by the rising accessibility of devices like tablets and smartphones that have made the electronic medium cheaper and more universal (1).” Literature has evolved