Publishing in the digital age

I read today an article by John Batelle “Toward a New Understanding of Publishing”, where he talks about the new definition of publishing and how it has evolved to it’s current state.

Think of publishing as speaking – a conversation – it’s clear that publishing means far more than printing. Publishing means connecting a community through the art and science of communication. And nowhere is publishing more vibrant – and conversational – than through the medium we’ve come to call the Internet.

He talks in this article about how brands can have a voice of their own, and how they can also participate in these “conversations ”. To me the idea isn’t groundbreaking. Yes, any brand can become a “publisher” producer of different types of content that enables them to interact and engage with their user communities. The trick is to do something more, something different than just transporting the analog way of doing things into the digital world.

The launch of the iPad brought up this problem very clearly. The savior of newspapers worked fine as a device and had (still has) loads of potential. The magazines released as apps for the device however lacked in standard, usability and features. But the worst of all they didn’t bring anything significantly new to the table. Consumers pretty much got the same exact thing they had gotten before but with few gimmicks and videos added to it. It felt like what paper publishers would have come up with if the iPad was launched 30 years ago. There was nothing groundbreaking or significantly new about the app magazines despite the huge potential that could be done on the new tablet devices.

What were suffering now from, a year after the launch of the Apple’s iPad, is a big myriad of different publications’ apps for different devices that all work more or less differently. The industry standard is yet undefined at it makes it a pain for the consumers and publishers. Entering this market means you’re probably going to be investing a lot of money and time to keep yourself in the “constant state of beta” like Juan Señor of Innovation Media Consulting recommends.

Until some industry standards are defined it’s going to be risky for publishers to enter but there is hope as well. Magazine design icon Roger Black is currently working on his latest project called the “Treesaver”, which is “a HTML-based project aimed at dealing with device fragmentation”. Magazine publishers will be able to lay out their articles once onto the system and have them readable across a myriad of platforms and devices such as tablets, PCs and smartphones.  The HTML format also enables publishers to separate themselves from the app stores and by doing so, make more money for themselves.  (Treesaver)