Digital & the Changing Publishing Landscape
BEA
May 29, 2009
Hugh McGuire

Digital is changing publishing.
We’ve seen this before:
music, newspapers, encyclopedia, movies...

Recent activity in the digital book space
❖ Feb 5: Google Book Search for iPhone announced
❖ Feb 9: Amazon Kindle 2 Launch
❖ Feb 25: Indigo launches Shortcovers mobile reading platform
❖ Mar 4: Amazon launches Kindle for iPhone
❖ Mar 5: Barnes & Noble acquires Fictionwise ebook store
❖ Mar 18: Fujitsu launches FLEPia – colour eBook reader
❖ Mar 19: Sony & Google announce 500,000 books for Sony's e-reader
❖ Apr 11: Barnes & Noble / Sprint announces e-reader discussions
❖ Apr 28: Amazon acquires Lexcycle/Stanza ereader for iPhone
❖ May 6: Amazon launches Kindle DX
❖ May 13: Amazon launches Encore, republishing “overlooked” work
❖ May 18: Scribd launches ebook store

Exponential growth of ebook sales
US Trade Wholesale, Q1 2002 - Q1 2009
$25,800,000
Source:
IDPF http://www.openebook.org/doc_library/industrystats.htm

Exponential growth of print-on-demand
Number of titles published in the USA, 2004-2008
300000
Number of titles published
250000
200000
Print-on-demand
150000
Traditional
100000
50000
0
2004 2005 2006 2007 2008
Year
Source:
http://bowker.com/index.php/press-releases/563-bowker-reports-us-book-production-declines-3-in-2008-but-qon-demandq-publishing-more-than-doubles

LibriVox.org
Objective:
To make all books in the public domain available,
for free, in audio format on the internet.

BookOven.com
An online platform for creating, collaborating
on, and selling books and ebooks.

The new face of publishing?
digital
DIY online sales
networked zero-capital
community cost distribution
collaborative mobile