The London Book Fair last week attracted its customary strong crowds with earnest conversations across small tables as publishers met the overseas professionals who might turn a local hit into an international bestseller. It was also of course a chance for book sellers, publishers, agents, authors and not forgetting printers, to catch up with one another and to discuss the state of this particular trade. Or trades because book publishing has always been several sectors glued together like signatures in a perfect bound book, academic publishing alongside children’s books, literary fiction jostling with trade illustrated or non fiction titles.
In the conference sessions around the exhibition halls topics covered AI and copyright as well as the evergreen subjects of How do I get my book published? The rise of AI seems to be the greatest challenge to the system of copyright since the concept that creators should benefit from their work was established centuries ago. AI writing is (not yet) up to scratch and dependent on ‘inspiration’ from existing works. Someone needs to pay. But if AI was on the agenda, sustainability was not. It could be that environmental issues have been absorbed into mainstream decisions making or have been pushed aside by the AI and other debates. The sustainability issue, however, is not sorted and organisers have some kind of duty to include sustainability in next year’s agenda.
The big take away that the exhibition crystallised is that books are becoming desirable items in their own right, not simply as a carrier of ideas and stories. This should be no surprise to those tracking the quality of entries to the Book Design & Production Awards where the quality and appeal of books has never been greater. That is now reflective of wider publishing where books are becoming like vinyl records, something to be seen to be possessed and saying something about their possessor, even if the book itself remains unread. This is in turn good news for print, underlining that trend to a future where the real value of print, in terms of emotions, longevity, familiarity and warmth are truly appreciated.
The renaissance of print is booked for the future
The London Book Fair last week attracted its customary strong crowds with earnest conversations across small tables as publishers met the overseas professionals who might turn a local hit into an international bestseller. It was also of course a chance for book sellers, publishers, agents, authors and not forgetting printers, to catch up with one another and to discuss the state of this particular trade. Or trades because book publishing has always been several sectors glued together like signatures in a perfect bound book, academic publishing alongside children’s books, literary fiction jostling with trade illustrated or non fiction titles.
In the conference sessions around the exhibition halls topics covered AI and copyright as well as the evergreen subjects of How do I get my book published? The rise of AI seems to be the greatest challenge to the system of copyright since the concept that creators should benefit from their work was established centuries ago. AI writing is (not yet) up to scratch and dependent on ‘inspiration’ from existing works. Someone needs to pay. But if AI was on the agenda, sustainability was not. It could be that environmental issues have been absorbed into mainstream decisions making or have been pushed aside by the AI and other debates. The sustainability issue, however, is not sorted and organisers have some kind of duty to include sustainability in next year’s agenda.
The big take away that the exhibition crystallised is that books are becoming desirable items in their own right, not simply as a carrier of ideas and stories. This should be no surprise to those tracking the quality of entries to the Book Design & Production Awards where the quality and appeal of books has never been greater. That is now reflective of wider publishing where books are becoming like vinyl records, something to be seen to be possessed and saying something about their possessor, even if the book itself remains unread. This is in turn good news for print, underlining that trend to a future where the real value of print, in terms of emotions, longevity, familiarity and warmth are truly appreciated.
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