I've been saying this same thing for yonks now. Publishers have got to see whar's coming and that it would be suicide on thier part if they don't make changes in how they deliver books.

I know it will be hard for them to rearrange their thinking and then their actual printing processes in order to create a new production model. So that's what I think the first big hurdle is, to recognize the problem, make adjustments and then carry on. 

They also need to recognize that some of these fixes will be only temporary as this evolution is at full speed and they have to find ways to keep up. All of the time spent moaning and griping about it won't change anything.

It will be noticed that there are a few people standing around griping but hopefully those people won't be in the way and can again hopefully take advantage of the work their colleagues have done. That is of course assuming any of them can work out that what they're doing now won't work for the long haul. Times change, keep up or get ground under, it's not as though they weren't warned.

I know there are die hard people who think the book in it's current form is like the bible of production but I can see the evolution, the revolution of how that will change.

If they want to pander a bit to collectors then make limited editions of hard bound books and stick with that and the people who are true collectros will find them somwhow. In fact that would make their collectors gene even sweeter to have the rare books they're looking for really be rare.

I can't really think of anything else because this is my firm belief about publishing and let's face it polution too. It might not be as bad as making aluminum but pulp is not safe and a lot of it is being made right here in Alaska, pulp that is. It's poluted some of the very most beautiful coast line in the world and inland streams where bears go to catch salmon, where deer an other animals unite for a drink.

So that's my 3 pennies

Sly