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Books will survive, but not on paper

By Susan Hayes - posted Tuesday, 15 September 2009


Of course, a number of leading Australian publishers have already established strategies to take them into the new markets offered by the digital world.

For a number of years, the Australia Council has funded online journals and we are viewing with particular interest the rise of the well-written blog. Canadian blogger Christian Lander's Stuff White People Like was picked up by Random House for print publication and subsequently optioned for film. Our own Marieke Hardy was the key speaker at this year's NSW Premier's Book Awards.

Equally, over the past year I have had two separate approaches from leading Australian critics who want to create an online literary review, with the editorial integrity of, say, the New York or London reviews of books.

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Writers with ambitions to self-publish online will need to develop advanced technical and presentation skills. They need to be aware that online distribution is not necessarily a splendid opportunity for all those authors whose manuscripts have been rejected by hard-hearted editors.

While the internet is touted as a medium for global exposure, where previously unknown artists can find instant fame, this has certainly not been the case for the music industry.

Despite the universal appeal of the iPod and downloadable music, it has been established that fewer than 80 per cent of songs published on the net without the marketing push of the recording companies, achieve more than a handful of sales.

It is certainly a fact that those book publishers who are ahead of the game are taking advantage of the internet for marketing, rather than innovations in text.

Poetry publishing has always been a risky business and I am convinced that the new interest in poetry and poetry slams that we are seeing today is a direct consequence of online publication.

Today's poetry reader can take their virtual trolley to a one-stop shop, collect poems of their choice and have them delivered as a personalised anthology of favourites. Or why not download a love poem to your mobile phone and send it as a Valentine?

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In place of black marks on a white page, the words of a digital poem can dance across the screen to a background of moving images and seductive sound.

There is an air of wait-and-see in Australian publishing. Australians read more books per capita than any other nation and I still see more people on public transport reading books than I see game-playing on their phones or laptops.

There is no doubt that a huge marketing campaign will accompany the arrival of the Kindle in 2010 and it will be interesting to see the effects on publishers and book-buyers.

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First published in The Australian on September 4, 2009.



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About the Author

Susan Hayes is director of literature at the Australia Council for the Arts.

Creative Commons LicenseThis work is licensed under a Creative Commons License.

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