Publishing for the 21st Century

I think the question of publishing in the 21st century is very much a topic for here and now. We're ten years into the century and this discussion seems more in place in the 19th century!

Forgive me if I sound like an idealist or an anarchist, and at the risk of being incendiary, I don't think the problem is how to stop people from getting what you have written for free. Surely writers want as many people to read their material as possible. Isn't that the point? Which great writers have given up writing? There are surely more writers today, being read by more people than ever before, all thanks to the internet! There were also plenty of penniless authors long before the internet and all great writers began writing for nothing. I don't think Mayakovsky was blogging when he wrote Talking with the Taxman about Poetry. The internet is not an enemy any more than was the invention of paper or of printing although I'm quite sure there were people who insisted on manuscripts being copied out by hand using quills on papyrus.

The internet can make any information freely available. This is what the technology can do, and it is wonderful. I don't believe you can stop it, any more than you can stop people talking to each other on telephones, or stop people sending each other emails. The question is, as authors, how can you continue to make a living from writing? Indeed, can you reasonably expect to make a living from writing? As long as there is still something to read (which there will be!) this problem really only affects authors and publishers, and not the other 99% of the population

I was speaking to an educational publisher recently, who reckoned they had another ten years or so before people stopped buying printed text books, and even that was because most teachers are not so technically literate. Parts of the publishing industry are likely to fight this tooth and nail, just as type-setters fought against computerisation of newspapers. I am sure the battle will be lost sooner or later, perhaps not this year or next year.

The same thing is happening to the music industry with record companies. As the name suggests, record companies began by selling plastic discs... anyone bought one of those in the last two decades? Buying music is now an alien concept to most people under 20. There is a story of the day somebody showed Napster to a group of music industry executive. Their first questions were whether songs they liked were up there. Their first reaction (as music lovers) was that it was fantastic! I'm not sure of the exact story, but I think Napster were willing to work with the record companies, but the record companies were asking for too much money.

Reading things on the internet does not fall into any commonsense definition of stealing. Copyright laws only really make sense to the owners of presses.

Both publishers and record companies rely on a percentage of sales to authors or artists, but online is free and any percentage of zero is zero! That model does not work.

Rather than stopping people from reading something if they don't pay, the challenge is providing a platform that can support writers. This means providing a mechanism for people to pay while reading or after reading and getting sponsorship or getting advertising.

I was just looking for the South Park Episode Whale Whores (now that the Cove has won an oscar!) and noticed that it has been taken down from You Tube, but can be seen for free on http://www.southparkstudios.com

Publishers are busy trying to work this out, but their starting point is making money. Several website makers are also trying to work this out and their starting point is getting information on line. I suspect the websites are going to win!

Thanks for reading! (All free!)