How technology will change the publishing industry in Italy

The publishing industry is going through an important moment of change triggered by the advent of digital technology.

In the USA, in fact, the e-book is already a well-established reality, it was recently reported that even in the UK, in some web shops, the sale of digital books has surpassed that of books on paper. And more and more often the books self-published by authors, without passing through a publisher, reach the top of the charts, and then be “consecrated” by the publication even on paper.

The first reason why this data is to be found in the timing: at the moment here in Italy the digital book is around 2%; it can be expected that it will reach mass dimensions only in five or ten years at the most, around 20%. Not even experts dare to give more precise figures. One can only keep oneself informed and prepare oneself for the changes. There is still the problem of the lack of a widespread format and prevailing support, which hinders its widespread dissemination.

Italian publishers have an ambiguous approach to this revolution. In general, the impression is that the big publishing industry divides itself facing the unknown on one side and attempts to jump on the winner’s bandwagon. In the last two years, fortunately, in Italy too, the discussion on digital publishing and self-publishing has begun, thanks to interesting conferences such as “IfBookThen”, “Bye Bye Book?” or “Librinnovando”.

The first obvious, and positive, the consequence is that self-publishing is killing pay publishing (the so-called vanity press); aspiring authors who do not want to submit to the judgment of agents and publishers can self-publish directly, without being victims of unscrupulous exploiters. This frees up space in bookshops for quality paper books.

The most important thesis is that the world of paper publishing is undergoing a change similar to that which occurred in the music industry with the advent of “liquid” music (mp3 etc.) and file sharing, but the risk is to learn nothing from the experience of the music industry: all the big publishers are repeating the same mistakes made by the music majors at the time. For example, that of considering digital pirates as the number one enemy, instead of lowering media prices. Statistics show that digital piracy is not the enemy to fight: on the contrary, it often helps to sell more copies. Luckily, many publishers are already rethinking themselves and soon DRM protections (which irritate those who legitimately paid for the book, and are easily circumvented by hackers) will be removed from e-books.

Digital technology can eliminate the publishing intermediary between author and translator: we may find ourselves working directly for an author, but he has less money to invest, not being an industrial reality; and therefore, we may have to share the entrepreneurial risk of the author, accepting that part of our compensation is the percentage of copies sold. A double-edged sword, as we already know, especially in a small publishing market like the Italian one. Furthermore, this assumes that the translator must develop the ability to find clients in a wider market, acquiring a whole series of skills that until now were more inherent in technical translation than editorial translation (self-promotion, online client search, international client management with foreign currency payments, etc.), or the specific prerogative of rights offices and literary agents (management and purchase of international translation rights).

The phenomenon of online publishing is only just beginning. It is only with the passage of time that we will find out whether a more fluid and democratic market generates a greater flow of profits, and that the decrease in other costs may divert these profits also to better remuneration for translators.

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