In order for the sort of system I am considering to work, there would
still be a need for intermediaries to edit and review, format, et
cetera, to ensure a high quality finished product.
I see no reason not to also have individuals/firms specializing in
marketing etextbooks, even for specific markets such as high schools,
medical schools, et cetera. I doubt you could get school adoption
without direct sales contact. I suspect the school adoption process is
an arduous one. On the other hand, you would have a guaranteed number
of sales. I think you would want to work with someone that was
experienced in marketing textbooks to your market already.
A related issue is which schools (if any) would/could adopt entirely
electronic textbooks. If schools could/would not do that, there would
have to be some means of producing and delivering physical books to at
least some students. That does not seem to be an insurmountable
problem. The key would be to get school adoption.
But I am not solely thinking about etextbooks. There could just as well
be other ebooks produced without the current physical publishers. Such
ebooks would also need editing and review, formatting, et cetera. That
also seems quite doable. An important point here would be how to ensure
copyright protection. I think it is inevitable that there would be some
violations, so some form of DRM could be useful.
Regardless, it should still be possible to price ebooks significantly
lower than the current situation. The current pricing of ebooks is
designed by the publishers to protect their physical copy sales. If you
do not have physical copy sales to protect, you are in a very different
situation. As a side benefit, lower pricing would encourage compliance
with respecting the copyright -- at least in some markets. (Not to
mention all the trees that would be saved.)
As far as Apple goes, who knows ? The owner of the content is in a
stronger position to negotiate with the publishers or others to perform
editing, review, et cetera. From what little I have read about Apple's
moves into epublishing, it seems Apple is moving to control ownership of
the content as completely as possible.
The move away from the big publishers in the science and math journals
seems to be an example of some people realizing they can use the new
technology to circumvent the publishers' "blockade".
Joe
On 4/20/12 3:53 PM, Owen Densmore wrote:
On Fri, Apr 20, 2012 at 2:10 PM, Joseph Spinden <j...@qri.us
<mailto:j...@qri.us>> wrote:
My thought was that there could be an intermediate ground that
might be more profitable for the authors and less expensive for
the consumers.
Amazon built a tremendous business by eliminating store fronts.
So, I was thinking of what parts of the print publishers' current
functions could be taken over by strictly electronic publishers.
That could be an interesting alternate business model.
Joe
I like the idea of removing the middle man .. i.e. treating publishers
as a service providing editing, review, formatting and so on, but
moving the books themselves to a "co-op" in the cloud.
With textbooks, there is also the publisher-school system middle man.
Could this be removed as well?
I can't tell what role Apple is trying to have in textbooks. Are they
publishers? Interface to the school systems? Do they remove a middle
man or simply replace one with a new one?
Pamela: some of your books come in Kindle versions. Do you have any
insights about whether or not digital books work out well for the
authors? Has it hurt, for example, via piracy?
-- Owen
Slightly off-topic: in the science and math journals, there is a
serious effort to move away from the huge publishers, especially
Elsevier and its very large number of journals they've quietly
acquired over the last decade or two. This is succeeding, even to the
point of peer reviews being managed by the coop, not the publisher.
---------- Forwarded message ----------
From: *Owen Densmore* <o...@backspaces.net <mailto:o...@backspaces.net>>
Date: Fri, Jan 27, 2012 at 10:02 AM
Subject: Elsevier --- my part in its downfall « Gowers's Weblog
To: Complexity Coffee Group <friam@redfish.com <mailto:friam@redfish.com>>
Timothy Gowers the Fields medalist mathematician has a recent post on
Elsevier and a growing movement to boycott their use
http://gowers.wordpress.com/2012/01/21/elsevier-my-part-in-its-downfall/
This includes not submitting to the VERY MANY math journals owned by
Elsevier:
http://www.elsevier.com/wps/find/P11.cws_home/mathjournals
.. or reviewing submissions
One previous successful act against Elsevier was extraction of the
Journal of Topology
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Topology_(journal)
<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Topology_%28journal%29>
On 10 August 2006, after months of unsuccessful negotiations with
Elsevier about the price policy of library subscriptions, the
entire editorial board
<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Editorial_board> of the journal
handed in their resignation, with effect from 31 December
2006. Subsequently, two more issues appeared in 2007 with papers
that had been accepted before the resignation of the editors. In
early January the former editors instructed Elsevier to remove
their names from the website of the journal, but Elsevier refused
to comply, justifying their decision by saying that the editorial
board should remain on the journal until all of the papers
accepted during its tenure had been published.
In 2007 the former editors announced the launch of the/ Journal of
Topology/, run under the auspices of the London Mathematical
Society
<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/London_Mathematical_Society> at a
significantly lower price.
Its interesting that Timothy also refers to SOPA/PIPA and took part in
the wikipedia led protest. (I just found out that wordpress made a
plugin that folks all could use for that and future protests.
Impressive!)
I'd really like more of us to be careful about our papers and demand
they be open. Its not exactly black/white, but certainly the papers
have to be publicly available, whatever else the publisher's rights
may be.
I'd like your opinions, which are quite likely more informed than mine.
-- Owen
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