Jumat, 06 November 2009

Empowering the Literary Masses

Every individual has unique experience, skills and knowledge. The general public craves enrichment in the form of such information. Information such as how to plaster a wall, repair a car engine, succeed at mathematics or cultivate plants. Yes, this sort of information can usually be found freely on the internet, but in a limited form.

The person with the comprehensive target information does not usually make it available, and therein lies the problem. How can ordinary people share their specialist knowledge with others? The answer is to sell it, in the form of digital media. This might be in the form of eBooks, video, audio, digital art, music, animation, software applications, computer code/games, templates, flash, podcasts, photography, musical scores, presentations and graphic designs, to mention but a few.

So why is this not happening already? Well, because there is no plausible platform to facilitate such endeavours. Ebay was once a solution, but they no longer permit digital downloads. The traditional paper publishing route is fraught with expense, delay and often, disappointment. There are, of course, a multitude of eBook stores on the web, but these tend to be either expensive or contain low quality products. In these credit crunching days it is imperative that quality comes with low cost.

My job as an Editorial Director is to oversee the marriage of quality and low cost. My team and I are constantly encouraging and advising contributing authors, whilst facilitating rapid publication of their work on our site. To ensure that authors can publish without cost to themselves it is necessary to provide free graphic design (covers) and marketing services. We feel that we are empowering the literary masses, providing a platform of opportunity.

I am frequently told that to have ones own publication available for sale throughout the globe is a truly wonderful experience. Authors do not need to be university educated, journalistic, or even creative. The bottom line is that specialist knowledge is of high value. A first attempt at writing can often be a daunting challenge, but guidance for unpublished authors is the responsibility of the publisher. We provide this in both written and verbal forms.

The main motivation for publishing anything is money. Those who are fortunate enough to have their work accepted by major publishing houses are either full-time authors or have spent months compiling their work. The average person might be able to commit a few hours or days to a digital publication. That implies that their contribution is short, but we ensure that it delivers on its title and is of good quality. After all, if I wanted to plaster that wall, repair my car engine, learn maths or care for my plants then I want the information quickly, without reading a huge amount.

The future of publishing lies on electronic paper or readers, and quality always comes before quantity. It is now time to cultivate the untapped literary riches with the digital plough.