Editorial: Bring on the digital overthrow of publishing

Last week's release of the Amazon Kindle Paperwhite offered an opportunity to look back on the rapid growth of e-reading, and look forward to what the digitization of publishing will mean to four major market forces: publishers, bookstores, authors and readers. As during any technological disruption, winners and losers trade fates until the upheaval settles and a new cycle of status quo begins.

Amazon is not the only bookstore represented in the scramble for new-era survival, but its major role has multiple dimensions: seller, publisher, enabler, inventor and primary instigator of disruption. Amazon is banking on being a winner, and was recently handed an advantage by the U.S. government in its uneasy relationship with publishers.

While industrial forces work their way through the dislocation of new paradigms, individuals -- both book consumers and book authors -- stand to be the biggest winners, and that is a good thing.

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Filed under: Handhelds, Tablets, Wireless, Amazon

Editorial: Bring on the digital overthrow of publishing originally appeared on Engadget on Mon, 08 Oct 2012 17:00:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.