Publishing has always been a difficult business to promote successfully, which titles by which authors to promote,which genre, will it be fiction or non-fiction? Will they sell? Will they make money, both for the publisher and forthe author? So many questions which there is no definitive answer and so the publisher takes a chance with his money and his time and resources and decides on which books topublish, promote and distribute to the bookshops. He mayonly distribute to bookshops in his own country and if they don't sell well enough, will not be seen by anyone else inthe world.

What a loss to humankind and their quest for more knowledgeto enhance their work, their lives.

The fount of civilisations knowledge were always universities, libraries, and bookshops, and if publishers don't find it profitable to publish certain titles at all, to distribute touniversity libraries, and bookshops, then civilisation is the poorer.

When I was young going through school the public library wasa must to enhance my knowledge of the world around me, itfilled the gaps in my science, geography and literaturelessons, and gave me new insight. I often gazed in awe at the rows of shelving containing all the worlds knowledge which had been written up by scientists, explorers, academics, and others, and oftentimes, you would have seen me takingan armful of books home to read at bedtime, anything fromhow atoms work, to famous authors tales of pirate treasure or tales of Victorian London.

The young people of today have all this technology at hand, not only at school, but in the home as well, they are only a mouse click away to the fount of knowledge, but in digitalform on the internet. Many students believe that if a book isnot on the internet it does not exist, and they would not waste time going around to the local bookshop on their HighStreet to enquire about it.

It behoves, therefore, all authors, publishers and booksellers, to at least put a synopsis of their books on the internet so at least letting peple know they exist, and where to obtain it in print or where to download it from. Many books are now downloadable, but they are published only by technologyenlightened individuals, not the large publishers.

Even prints can be obtained from such e-books, the technologyhas advanced that far. It needs the willingness of publishersand authors to add value to this new fount of knowledge. The first great library was established in Alexandria, in ancient Egypt by Ptolemy, but it was burnt down later by invaders, and all manuscripts were lost. What lost knowledge we could have gained we do not know, for there was often only one copy made on papyrus scrolls and no other copies evermade. With the internet and the enormous computing capacity we have, there would be countless copies of e-books onlinefor instant download, and therefore new knowledge, and works of great literature, need never be lost, for they are so easily replicable and distributable to a potential audience of three billion people on this planet.

Modern man, and woman, now looks for information on theinternet, they no longer go to bookshops looking for it, with the enormous capacity available, all informationshould be on the internet including all government information.

The fact that retail sales of printed books have been falling off over the last few years means that publishers, and authors, have got to get with the new technology - we no longer use papyrus scrolls.


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The author Tony Dean runs a web site where he has free ebooks
for instant download as well as sells ebooks and software.
"The Best Ebook and Software Site On The Net!"
http://www.ebook-sales.com