Publishing has always been a difficult business to promote
successfully, which titles by which authors to promote,
which genre, will it be fiction or non-fiction? Will they
sell? Will they make money, both for the publisher and for
the author? So many questions which there is no definitive
answer and so the publisher takes a chance with his money
and his time and resources and decides on which books to
publish, promote and distribute to the bookshops. He may
only distribute to bookshops in his own country and if they
don't sell well enough, will not be seen by anyone else in
the world.
What a loss to humankind and their quest for more knowledge
to enhance their work, their lives.
The fount of civilisations knowledge were always universities,
libraries, and bookshops, and if publishers don't find it
profitable to publish certain titles at all, to distribute to
university libraries, and bookshops, then civilisation is
the poorer.
When I was young going through school the public library was
a must to enhance my knowledge of the world around me, it
filled the gaps in my science, geography and literature
lessons, and gave me new insight. I often gazed in awe at
the rows of shelving containing all the worlds knowledge
which had been written up by scientists, explorers, academics,
and others, and oftentimes, you would have seen me taking
an armful of books home to read at bedtime, anything from
how atoms work, to famous authors tales of pirate treasure or
tales of Victorian London.
The young people of today have all this technology at hand,
not only at school, but in the home as well, they are only
a mouse click away to the fount of knowledge, but in digital
form on the internet. Many students believe that if a book is
not on the internet it does not exist, and they would not
waste time going around to the local bookshop on their High
Street to enquire about it.
It behoves, therefore, all authors, publishers and booksellers,
to at least put a synopsis of their books on the internet so at
least letting peple know they exist, and where to obtain it
in print or where to download it from. Many books are now
downloadable, but they are published only by technology
enlightened individuals, not the large publishers.
Even prints can be obtained from such e-books, the technology
has advanced that far. It needs the willingness of publishers
and authors to add value to this new fount of knowledge.
The first great library was established in Alexandria, in
ancient Egypt by Ptolemy, but it was burnt down later by
invaders, and all manuscripts were lost. What lost knowledge
we could have gained we do not know, for there was often only
one copy made on papyrus scrolls and no other copies ever
made. With the internet and the enormous computing capacity
we have, there would be countless copies of e-books online
for instant download, and therefore new knowledge, and works
of great literature, need never be lost, for they are so
easily replicable and distributable to a potential audience
of three billion people on this planet.
Modern man, and woman, now looks for information on the
internet, they no longer go to bookshops looking for it,
with the enormous capacity available, all information
should be on the internet including all government
information.
The fact that retail sales of printed books have been
falling off over the last few years means that publishers,
and authors, have got to get with the new technology -
we no longer use papyrus scrolls.
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The author Tony Dean runs a web site where he has free ebooks
for instant download as well as sells ebooks and software.
"The Best Ebook and Software Site On The Net!"
http://www.ebook-sales.com
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