Information Technology Reference
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for free] but gain a few sales because more people will know about the
work. If I'm right, we'll be profitable. If I'm wrong, I'll get kicked out.
(Pinter, 2008)
Bloomsbury Academic aims to publish 40 to 50 titles in its first year.
The jury is still out, given that it is only early days, but this certainly
throws down the gauntlet to many traditional university presses.
Another interesting variant is Faber's 'pay-what-you-want ebook',
giving readers the chance to pay what they believe is appropriate for
historian Ben Wilson's latest book,
What Price Liberty?
Its print price is
£14.99, with Faber giving readers the opportunity to set their own
price, or even download for free. Faber is expecting the experiment to
increase the sales of the printed book, 'adding sales rather than
replacing them' (Lea 2009). A number of internet commentators, such
as Doctorow (2007), have argued that putting your material free online
leads to more print sales, through either traditional publishers or POD
outlets.
The Open Monograph Press (OMP) software will also encourage an
alternative approach to monograph publishing. OMP is 'based on a
modular design for an online system that would foster, manage, and
publish monographs in digital and print forms using open-source
software developments, drawn from journal publishing, and social
networking technologies that might contribute not only to the
sustainability of monograph publishing but to the quality of the
resulting books' (Willinsky, 2009).
Textbook publishing
Gomez, in
Print is Dead
(2008), traces the history of the relatively slow
acceptance of the e-book. Users have had problems with e-readers,
reading a full book online, interoperability between providers and prices
of e-content. Before the major economic downturn of late 2008,
textbooks had already been under pressure from declining student
budgets and the Google generation's desire for online 'gobbets' of
information. Students used to accessing information and entertainment
for free, either through university libraries or via music downloads, are
increasingly reluctant to pay significant amounts of money for
textbooks, particularly as their economic circumstances decline. The
