Grumpy Old Bookman
Drowning in data
Keeping on top of publishing developments is much easier than it once was. Too easy, suggests Michael Allen
You may be tired of hearing it said that this is a golden age of opportunity for writers; but the cliché is true nevertheless. What is also true, but less often said, is that opportunities seldom present themselves without some snags and difficulties attached.
For writers, our opportunities arise from the unprecedentedly rapid pace of changes in technology. And one of the chief snags, oddly enough, is keeping informed about those changes. So let us quickly review some of the major changes in our technology, over the last few decades, and then look at the snags. We may save ourselves a lot of trouble.
For most of the 20th century the hardware of printing and publishing didn’t change much at all. Books were printed on big, heavy machines that went clank and smelt of hot oil. In 1950, no printer would dirty his machine for an order of less than a thousand copies. Maybe 500, if you let him borrow your girlfriend. As for making a single copy of anything, from a one-page letter to a whole book – well, that was very difficult.
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