Who is a publisher and How do you define publishing?
What happens when a publisher has a tight, direct connection with readers, is able to produce intellectual property that spreads, and can do both quickly and at low cost?
Seth Godin About the Domino project
Digital tools have expanded the definition of publishing to something I would have never thought possible 10 or even 5 years ago. For every author that makes a big publishing deal (like those mentioned in this Mashable 2009 article) there are hundreds if not thousands of niche authors selling their books directly to interested audiences either through their websites, through an aggregator or through the big vendors like Apple's iBookstore and Amazon's Kindle Direct Publishing program.
We are able, if we choose to, to connect directly with our audiences and interact in ways that were not possible before the advent of web technologies. We can turn our blogs and wikis as our communication channel with the audience, using their feedback and engagement as a measure of what content we should work with, edit and refine over time; maybe even using audience engagement as the metrics for additional content and conversion to other formats.
Some examples of this new publishing medium include, among others:
PressBooks #
PressBooks uses WordPress as the engine behind a multi publishing paradigm. It gives authors a familiar interface, many people are used to WordPress as either a blogging or content management platform so how we write our content doesn't change much from how we write traditional blog posts.
The interface produces web content (hosted in the Pressbook platform), epub and PDF content. Pressbook has also entered in partnerships with book distributors to provide a turnkey solution for people interested in self publishing.
The Atavist #
Atavist is a media and software company at the forefront of digital, mobile publishing. Our mission is to enable the next generation of multimedia storytelling, reaching readers across mobile devices and the Web.
Our flagship publishing arm, The Atavist—built on Creatavist—features original pieces of longform, nonfiction journalism. Sold individually on mobile devices and e-readers as “e-singles,” The Atavist is digital-first, pushing the boundaries of multimedia publishing while always emphasizing the story above all.
The Atavist is as close as I've found to what I envision a future publishing enterprise. It is clean, multi format and it's never a cookie cutter exercise; not all stories are available in all formats but when they use a format they take full advantage of available capabilities.
Hi #
Hi takes the opposite approach to The Atavist. Hi uses short 30 word moments with required location and an optional photograph. Other community members can request that you expand the moment with additional text; you can accept or decline the request.
I particularly like the way that Hi builds community by allowing users to request additional information about moments and subscribing to people who you're interested in: every time they write an expanded moment. I like this concept as much, if not better, than Twitter.