Book publishers fear advance of digital "glacier" (News Feature)

By Jean-Baptiste Piggin Oct 14, 2009, 14:32 GMT

Frankfurt - Online writing is like an unstoppable 'glacier' coming towards the world book publishing industry, says a book industry expert, summing up the worries for the future this week at the Frankfurt Book Fair in Germany.

'Digital content is completely altering the publishing industry,' said Eoin Purcell, a consultant and writer, warning that even the most respected names in publishing will not be able to claim any 'right to survive' in the new book economy.

The spectre haunting the industry is the discovery that today, everybody is a writer.

Whether it is a novel, a blog or a news report, millions of people are dying to get published, and are offering their thoughts and fiction online for free. Many are good writers: after all, every famous writer today also started out as an unknown.

'We are a tiny industry perched atop a massive hobby,' said Richard Nash, a consultant.

'At the same time our audience is shrinking,' added Kieron Smith, chief of British retailer The Book Depository, addressing 350 book professionals from 30 countries at a 'tools of change' conference at the fair.

This year, sales in Britain of video games exceeded those of books in value terms for the first time, he said.

Joking, Smith added that the industry might face a future 'armageddon' when 'we have more writers than readers.'

At this year's book fair, publishers seem to be divided into two camps. Continental European publishers are pressing governments to shore up copyright laws and protect the industry from copying.

Senior Spanish publisher Jesus Badenes fumed about the scanning of 10 million mainly out-of-print books by US search giant Google for online delivery, calling it a 'comprehensive act of piracy.'

That camp gained some solace from Chancellor Angela Merkel, who promised at the fair she would get aggressive and 'support copyright worldwide,' grimly adding, 'This is going to be a tough one.'

The other camp argues that publishers should stop whining, devise new and irresistible ways of selling information, and roll out digital books faster and better than the so-called pirates.

'We as publishers have to abandon the notion that our previous business model is permanent,' said Nash. Speakers traded ideas on how to evade what Purcell called 'this glacier that is mowing us down.'

Kassia Krozser, a respected New York blogger, urged the book industry to no longer regard paper books as their prime product. Her slogan is: 'Digital first, print maybe.'

China is guest of honour at this year's book fair, an invitation that has triggered controversy because of its censorship practices. But China is also the home of one of the world's boldest digital ventures, Shanda Literature.

Shanda has more than 800,000 writers who seek fame, and at least 4 million readers - the number varies according to who counts - who pay to read fiction on their mobile phones by installments.

The venture's chief, Hou Xiaoquiang, explained to western publishers at the fair how it became a huge success.

More than 100 people, including some of the biggest names in publishing, listened attentively to the Shanda presentation.

A key to the business is Shanda's relationship with wireless company China Mobile, which has 600 million customers and collects the micropayments from those reading these novels, typically 2 to 3 yuan cents per 1,000 words.

Hou said Shanda shares 20 to 50 per cent of the income with authors and now has more than 100 authors who have earned more than 100,000 yuan (14,700 dollars) from their writing so far.

Shanda's three websites publish the writing direct, without editing.

Zhang Wei, the top-selling author, told publishers in Frankfurt he expected to earn 2.5 million yuan this year as a Shanda author.

'We post the first 10 per cent of our books free,' he said. 'That gets the readers 'sticky' so they want more.' Then they pay.

Herman Spruijt, president of the International Publishers Association (IPA), said he perceived the Shanda system as being comparable to newspapers, where readers keep paying to read daily articles by their favourite columnists.