The E-book as Argued on CBC Radio

Posted by Hal
Tags: blogging, surveillance, exposure, news, personal

I was on CBC Radio’s The Current this morning. You can download the podcast here.

I discussed/argued the e-book with journalist Noah Richler and David Kent, President of HarperCollins Canada. It was pretty entertaining. I was coming at it from the perspective of a writer, particularly one without the benefit at this current point in time of a publishing deal with a multinational corporate-owned publisher. (Interestingly enough, the producer who contacted me told me she was having trouble finding a writer willing to talk about e-books and publishing…)

So my take on it: small presses and independents are shut out of the chain bookstores that comprise the majority of the marketplace. Furthermore, even those writers who are published by a big company are finding themselves marginalized if they can’t generate significant sales. From that point of view, the e-book can only help writers who won’t find their books stacked up at Indigo or Barnes & Noble anytime soon. 

Obviously this is a complicated and divisive issue but I think the situation is relatively dire in terms of access — there are 10,000 plus books published every year in Canada alone, but how many of them will you see browsing through your Superstore? I think the ebook will benefit independents and small presses, and those writers who are increasingly finding for-profit publishing a difficult fit for what they want to achieve. And what about books that fall out of print in a shockingly short amount of time? Things can only get better for writers in terms of ongoing sustained access to the marketplace.

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The Bloggist

Hey, I’m Hal Niedzviecki. I’m a writer/thinker who lives in Toronto, Ontario, Canada with my wife and daughter. Up till now I’ve always considered myself a private person. But at the same time I’m fascinated by people who effortlessly open themselves up to the whole world. So I’ve… more...

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