DIGITAL PUBLISHING Where We Are & Where We Are Going

1. DIGITAL PUBLISHING Where We Are & Where We Are Going And how libraries & publishers fit in! Eoin Purcell

3. From This

4. To This

5. Or This?

6. Some Things 30%+ - Trade publishers (especially larger ones) in the US, Genres much higher on release 20%+ - Trade Publishers (especially larger ones) in the UK, Again, Genres much higher on release. Nook (B&N/Microsoft), Kobo, Amazon, Google, Apple (And these are just the majors!!!!) (Sony, Toshiba, Copia + many others)

7. Behind The Stats - 30%: Mainly fiction, non-fiction MUCH more resistant, but not entirely. - Children's, although now growing rapidly, has not been a massive element. - Certain genres, in the initial weeks, can be over 50% digital. There seems to be a swing back towards print as a book ages (but that could be weird and odd data).

8. Behind The Stats - II - 30%: Sales growth is slowing in the US, but sales are reaching parity in the UK. Partly this is the law of big numbers, but it's also the power of print, the increased competition on mobile platforms. - Christmas 2012 was big for ebooks! Sales figures are pretty staggering: 5 million for 50 Shades, 1 million for Gone Girl Check out this page for some mouth watering figures! http://www.publishersweekly.com/pw/by-topic/industry-news/bookselling/article/56408-the-e-book-explosion-facts-figures-2012.html

9. Ireland Well we know at least one publisher is seeing digital unit sales exceeding print sales. Some trade publishers are seeing sales around 10% but most are less than that! Irish Times launching ebookstore in partnership with EpubDirect Kindle shift to .co.uk Most importantly we are seeing a huge shift in Libraries

10. Where Are We Going? €854,000,000 - What operators are willing to pay to ensure they can offer 4G services (faster mobile broadband - Increased competition from movies, music, games etc 71% - Smartphone penetration at the end 2012 - Not only will you need to be selling ebooks, but you'll need to consider how you sell ebooks on mobiles

11. And This!

12. The Future? - We can expect booksellers to weaken - We can expect ebooks and digital publishing to grow as a percentage of the book market - We can expect reading to come under pressure from other forms of entertainment - Libraries face issues too

13. Friends? Foes? - Preservers & protectors of knowledge - Curators & Filters - Providing access - Traditionally not-for-profit - Functions beyond books & literacy (at least in Ireland) - Finders & Promoters of good writing, financiers of literature - Curators & Filters - Finding audience - Profit seekers - Functions beyond profit mostly not real Publishers Libraries

14. We Have A Problem - Publishers never really liked libraries to begin with believing they bleed money from cash sales - Digital changes the game for libraries, enables numerous new services which publishers (for reasons of profit protection) wish to prevent. Current models only create digital approximation of print models. - The problem is that without profit, publishers won't exist

15. Libraries' Problems/Questions - Physicality - Model/Role - Staffing - Do you become publishers?

16. Possible Areas Of Compromise - Subscriptions to large volumes of material that is unmetered (ie - user numbers based rather than material accessed based). - Increased availability (around 1,000 ebooks available from Irish based publishers) - Willingness to experiment more widely with models of business and distribution

17. To Sum Up 1) We do different things for different reasons 2) Digital change has exposed these conflicting roles by challenging our existing partnership model 3) As this change progresses the danger for libraries as they urrently exist will become more acute 4) See no way to repair the current model or to close pandora's box 5) Forebearance on both sides is desirable