The future of e-publishing with a dash of Facebook

Tonight was the last night of my e-publishing course run by David Henley for UTS. I will miss the course because of the way it generated new ideas. Tonight was a blue sky session looking at the future, while also summarising areas previously covered.

I don't know about you, but sometimes I struggle to articulate comments or questions in simple ways. This seems to happen most frequently in two circumstances: where I actually know a lot, but don't know how much audience knowledge to assume; or, alternatively, where I know very little but have the glimpse of an idea, but don't know how to express it properly.

Thinking about my fumbling attempts, I decided to use this post to express three questions.

To begin with, what is the future of the e-reader? Today we have a number of readers broadly relying on two standards, both limited. In asking my question, my underlying feeling was that dedicated e-readers actually  had a limited future, that consumers would demand content that could be delivered regardless of device.

My second question related to the future of e-publishing itself. Did it have one? Very precisely, in a world in which content was increasingly sliced and diced to meet specific requirements, wouldn't everything outside transaction related services become e-publishing? In a way, this is just another version of the old convergence argument.

My third question focused on the independent publisher. The first effect of e-books and e-publishing was greatly widened choice for writers or content creators. However, as the big end of town moves in, as network economics and economies of scale set in, will choice actually narrow and even vanish in key areas? 

Now that I have actually defined those questions, a few comments on demographic trends. As so often happens with me, during the course I have been studying people on public transport to see just what they did. I have then asked people questions and looked at other sources of information. Not very scientific, but enough to indicate a few clues to user demographics.

To begin with, e-reader users are generally older (often a lot older) people who already read books. This is the dominant e-reader demographic.

Younger users are more likely to use mobiles or iPhones. And what do they look at? According to my eldest daughter, they browse shopping sites! That's probably not far out, although I have seen a few looking at Facebook. And speaking of Facebook, it's just so 2010!

Why do I say this? I have ten Facebook friends under thirty who, between them, have something over 5,000 friends. I may not have access to those friends' Facebook pages, but I do see the general interaction between the them and the ten on my list. I also belong to a small number of Facebook groups and have liked a number of pages from which I get posts. I joined Facebook in September 2007, so have been watching patterns for coming up on five years. Now without being too precise, let me tell you the patterns that I have observed:

1. The heaviest Facebook users are now older and also write in other fora including blogs and twitter.
2. The use of Facebook as a very regular communications device among friends has declined, at least so far as the younger age cohorts are declined. I am not privy to the private person to person messages, but the pattern seems clear. People check in to see what others are doing, they still use it to organise certain things including parties. But they don't use it to communicate in the way they used too, in part I suspect because it is now not private enough where large numbers of friends are involved.
3. The role of open pages or groups has increased.

Not sure what final conclusion I draw from all this, it's part of a natural pattern of change. Still, it's interesting.

Postscript:

In a comment, Legal Eagle wrote:

I can't believe that some people have 5000 "friends"! Those can't be real friends! And as I've noted here, it's difficult to let people drift off gracefully with FB.

I think that's one of the issues about FB - all your friends are in one monolithic bloc (as I've noted in the intro to this post.

I agree with you that there has been a decline in FB use. Part of that is because of the addictive nature of it. Also I agree that the main FB users (such as myself) are older, and write in blogs and twitter. I am also a user of an e-reader...but then I'm an older book reader who wanted to curb the number of books spilling out on to the loungeroom floor. I don't know that I've seen my students with any kind of e-reader.

The two posts LE cites above are worth reading. As it happened, on today's train I saw two twenty something with e-readers. But I reckon the broader point is still true.

Noddy ventures into e-publishing

I didn't make the e-publishing course last week. I was sick. However, I thought that I should continue my series to try to consolidate my thoughts. This will not be an exciting post and there will be errors. Further, I will be guilty of gross simplification. But I know that a few of my readers are interested.

We start with what might be called e-book stores. Examples include Amazon with kindle as a reader, Apple with iBooks, Kobo or Barnes & Noble with nook. There are Australian examples, but I will give them in a later post.

Now the next thing to remember is that you have to get your wonderful content into a form suitable for e-publication. Here there are two software standards, epub while Amazon has its own. The rules set by those software systems as well as the limitations of the various platforms on which people read have significant implications for the way you set out your work. You need to follow rules that can be quite constraining.

Putting that aside, how do you get your work into an e-store? You have two choices.

First, you can self-publish. Here you face two tasks beyond the simple act of preparing the original content. First, you have to get your content into the right form. This means translating the content with its imbedded software into the form required by the store. Secondly, you have to negotiate arrangements with the e-store. Both involve many tedious elements, but are not impossible.

Secondly, you can go to what is called an aggregator, the internet equivalent of a publisher.Examples include bookbaby, smashwords or in Australia Australian e-book publisher. The aggregator will assist you to put your content into the right form and arrange for its lodgment with the e-store.  Obviously you pay a price for this, but it makes things simpler and may increase the gross return.

This short description obviously conceals many complexities, and lord knows I'm not an expert. Still, it's a start. Any questions?  

Postscript

Neil Whitfield sent me the following link - MONOPOLISH. Worth a read.

The role of editor in an on-line world

Two week's ago, I reported (What do you want to know about e-publishing?) on my decision to enrol in an e-publishing course. While I haven't said anything since, the first two sessions have been as good as I hoped. Our tutor, David Henley, is good, while those enrolled are an interesting group including Dexter Dunphy who is interested in publishing his poetry on line. 

I will write something more on the things that I have learned a little later in the course just to help me consolidate my thoughts. For the moment, I mention that Neil Whitfield has put up his own post on e-publishing, E-books and editing–opportunity and hazard.

Over on Facebook, Helen Dale (skepticlawyer), wrote "Helen Dale had forgotten how difficult it is to edit to length for purposes of journalism. She is being reminded - with some force - why she hasn't done any opinion-editorial work since 2002." Helen is no mean writer, she won a Miles Franklin award in an earlier life; I feel for her!

In his post, Neil wonders (among other things) about the role of editing and the editor in an on-line world. All forms of publication, and e-publishing is just another form, have their own rules dictated by the structure of the medium. Because e-publishing is apparently so easy, it leads to real quality control problems. Neil gives one example.

To my mind, editing and the role of editors is just as important in the on-line environment as in print. The form of editing is changing, for the opportunities and constraints of on-line publishing affect the way words are presented and combined with other elements. Yet in a world that contains an ever growing volume of really bad crap, something that I referred to in a different context in Sunday Essay - is the internet drowning in it's own excreta?, a good editor can be vitally important in giving you that edge that allows your work to stand out.

Of course, these things are never clear cut. Some badly written pieces will sell because they appeal to to a particular market. Indeed, a good editor may even be a problem here! But I think that my comment is still true as a generalisation.

Some years ago, I read a biography of English writer Somerset Maugham. For the life of me, I cannot remember the title. That's a pity, because it was a very good book! I do remember, however, the descriptions of the sometimes complicated relations between Maugham and his editor. It was Maugham's work, but it gained from the editing.

As I write, youngest is using an editor to check her first book. It's not the first unpublished novel she wrote, just the first to be edited. Clare is a very good writer, different from her father, probably better than her father, but different. Despite her ear for dialogue, her grammar is so bad that it distracts from her writing.

That comment is not a criticism of her schooling. Clare works in bursts of enthusiasm and, when writing, just writes. It's very much part of her personality. Commenting on her preferred sporting role as hockey goalie, I once commented that the role suits her perfectly: long periods of nothing to do but gaze at the world, followed by intense bursts of excitement! So editing provides a check and a discipline.

Her father, too, could benefit from a good editor. Neil notes that much of what we regular bloggers write is actually first draft. Get it written, get it out. Sometimes that leads to painful results, but it's the reality of what we do.

The world changes if we want to turn our scribblings into something more. Now we have to consolidate, revise and edit. Now we could benefit from an editor, an external critic.

For the moment, the changes that have been taking place in publishing directly threaten the traditional role of editor. Editors are being retrenched as print publishers contract. My feeling is that this is just a transition, that the editor will re-emerge as an important element in the mix. The detail of the role will change, but the core elements will remain.

Postscript 24 July 2012

My friendly unpaid research assistant kvd drew my attention to these pieces by the Sydney Morning Herald's Judy Prisk. She occupies the apparently new position - at least new to me - of  Readers' Editor.

• 11 July 2012 Slow and steady no longer wins the race.
• 25 July In the frenzied world of digital-first news, a quick fix is essential.

I'm writing while eating tea after my return from the latest session in the e-publishing course. Two things stand out in my mind.

The first is the need to flow chart the e-publishing process. I find that this helps me understand. I will do this over the next week or so, get it checked, and then post it here. I should warn you, it won't be flash. My graphic skills can best be described as miniscule!

The second is the limitations in the e-publishing world as compared to either print or the broader internet. There are many things that you either can't or shouldn't do because of the problems they create. Like tables! You must work to the limitations of the medium.

I won't be posting today beyond this postscript. I fear that I need to settle down with some estimates spreadsheets due tomorrow.