Tomorrow is T-day. Or iDay. Or whatever. It’ll be fun. Nobody knows *anything* yet. Well, apart from the folks at McGraw-Hill and Hachette, probably Kobo, and a whole host of others. But for the purposes of this discussion: nobody *knows* *anything*.
About the Tablet, that is. Because, actually, we know quite a lot. We know about authors and writing, and editing and publishing, and bookselling and reading. We know and understand the long-form narrative and its place between people, and in society. And I’m more comfortable with Apple getting in on the act than I am about Amazon, because Apple aren’t in the content game, and Amazon definitely are. And if Apple swoop in and solve ebook distribution like they solved (legal, paid-for, mainstream) music distribution with iTunes, then great. Amazon are having a pretty good crack at that with Kindle too, but I’d like to see more involvement from someone without such an aggressive history of pressuring publishers until their bones show (although I’m under no illusions), and Apple have a history of producing devices and interfaces that make people go “Oh, OK. I get it now. Neat.” Amazon are also showing signs of a more open, mulitplatform approach (iPhone app, epub, etc) but that’s another conversation.
Publishers have been confused about their roles for some time. And I’m trying very hard not to be inconsistent on this, because I’ve spent several years urging publishers to get on board with new technologies and try new things, but equally I hope there’s space for a lot of publishers to get back to concentrating on what they do best: acquiring, editing, producing and publishing books. I’d like to have seen more happen in the last few years, but if it hasn’t, we should probably stop scrambling to get on the latest bandwagon (vanilla Books-as-Apps, I’m looking at you), and concentrate on the basics: ebook production, metadata, integrated marketing, quality and consideration. There is a lot to be done, but this or that device will never be the be-all-and-end-all of the future of publishing.
[…] Back to Basics — Booktwo.org’s James Bridle on the Apple tablet (what else?): I’ve spent several years urging publishers to get on board with new technologies and try new things, but equally I hope there’s space for a lot of publishers to get back to concentrating on what they do best: acquiring, editing, producing and publishing books… [W]e should probably stop scrambling to get on the latest bandwagon (vanilla Books-as-Apps, I’m looking at you), and concentrate on the basics: ebook production, metadata, integrated marketing, quality and consideration. There is a lot to be done, but this or that device will never be the be-all-and-end-all of the future of publishing. […]
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