Publish — or be damned
David Shelley, the CEO of the UK’s second largest publisher, Hachette, has warned of a “watershed moment” when it comes to freedom of expression. There have, of course, been other watershed moments in publishing such as the invention of the printing press in the fifteenth century and the e-book revolution of the late 1990s. But while Gutenberg’s genius opened up a rarefied market to anyone who could read and the digital revolution allowed entire libraries to be stored in your pocket, this latest moment threatens to undermine the very foundations of a free and open press.
Although many of us feared for the future of physical books, e-readers such as the Kindle could never quite compete with the feel and smell of a well-thumbed paperback. Unlike CDs and DVDs, books have an aesthetic appeal that goes beyond mere content. Unfortunately, the shops that sell these little bundles of enlightenment haven’t fared so well, with so many of us choosing to buy the latest blockbuster at a knockdown price on Amazon.
The ending of the net book agreement in 1997, another watershed moment, meant that retailers were able to discount books with impunity resulting in a fierce price war between Amazon and the big supermarkets. Retail giant Borders and Books Etc succumbed to rampant market forces back in 2009 and
