Multipublishing. An Emerging Digital Publishing Delivery Ecosystem

What does it mean to edit and publish in the digital age?

Digital technology is changing the game at every stage of a publisher's value chain, from content production to distribution.

The advent of desktop publishing (DTP) some thirty years ago gave us a foretaste of how publishing practices would change, and how content would be produced using what are essentially digital tools: a PC and DTP software.

The rapid evolution of technologies, and of the uses to which these technologies are put in terms of access to knowledge, has extended the use of digital technology beyond the production of content, to its distribution and consumption.

Economic history has proven it time and again: the arrival of new technologies facilitates the emergence of new modes of consumption, new forms of distribution, new players in the value chain, new business models. Content publishing is no exception.

Creating and consuming content has never been easier or more accessible. This phenomenon is global, and has been reported by several media observatories around the world. The figures speak for themselves, including in France.

And the situation is similar for traditional press and book publishers, as highlighted by the Aristote seminar . However, as economist Françoise Benhamou points out , "In France, books are still a paper market. Every year, around 440 million copies are sold. These copies include some 82,000 different titles, half of which are new releases.

This very dynamic market has a classic sales profile: a handful of titles sell very well, and most sell very poorly. Fnac stores generate 90% of their book sales from 10% of their catalog. Despite this overproduction, the management of unsold copies is an issue that is little discussed in the public sphere.

Digital technology represents a dual revolution - industrial and cognitive - which has had a dual impact on books. It is the birth of new ways of reading and new ways of appropriating one's reading.

Digital technology is both a great promise and a brutal destruction of value. The same page of text sees its value divided by ten as it goes from paper to digital. On the Internet, billions of pages are...