Well another week has flown by since my last blog, and a lot has happened since I last spoke to you. I have now become a publisher! I know it sounds impossible, but you can become one too! It’s simple!
This week was the first I’d ever heard of a certain website called Project Gutenberg (http://www.gutenberg.org/wiki/Main_Page). As it says on the website, 'Project Gutenberg is the place where you can download over 30,000 free ebooks to read on your PC, iPhone, Kindle, Sony Reader or other portable device' therefore it enables you to download any book that is out of copyright for free as an ePub, Mobipocket, HTML or simple text formats.
As I have no work of my own to publish, I went to this website and typed in an author and the title of the book that I wished to publish (I chose Jane Austen’s, Pride and Prejudice- a classic). Once it came up on the screen, I proceeded to copy and paste the novel in to Microsoft Word Document, and saved it. I then went on to a website called Lulu.com (http://www.lulu.com/uk/publish/books/). This website enables the public to take anything that they themselves have written, or something that someone else has written, and publish it into an actual book which is available for you, and others to buy online on amazon (an online retailer of books) http://www.amazon.co.uk. After signing up to Lulu's website I then went on to decide what sort of book I would like to publish the novel as, for example paperback or hardback, student's keep in mind that the cost of producing paperback is lower! Then the design, how would I like it bound, did I want it in colour or black and white, and the size of my pages. I proceeded to upload the file that I had saved in Microsoft Word earlier which was the actual content of the novel, and proceeded to chose the cover of the book and its layout. Whilst in the process of publishing my book, I found it was possible to add illustrations if you wish to do so, as long as you get the permission of the creator of the photo to use it, and include their name somewhere in the book, which I did on the back cover. As I decided to use the website flickr.com (http://www.flickr.com/) for this purpose, I had to ensure that the photos I chose to use were under the creative commons licence and therefore meant that I had permission to use them. I then saved all this information, and published the book. The cost of my book was £6.84, price varies depending on the type of book (paperback, hardback), size of the pages, and the amount of pages. The process of publishing the book took no longer than an hour to complete, and left me satisfied with the end product, as it was exactly how I envisaged it. It felt great to have my name on the front cover of a book! Take a look at it-
Can you believe that it is that simple and easy to publish your own book? If so, why not try it! I thought this website was amazing, and I’m not the only one, as I found a review of the website on ciao- http://www.ciao.co.uk/lulu_com__Review_5707484 which said 'So, how does it sound, if you had complete editorial control over your work? If you could publish it, edited as you wish, with your own cover design and everything you would like? It sounds great doesn't it?...and might even get you noticed by 'established' publishers'. Go on, have a go, you don't even have to buy it if you're not satisfied with it, why not do it for a bit of fun!
After fully enjoying the experience of publishing a book, and having full creative control of the end product I have decided that I will probably be using this process again to create my “artefact” for my practice-based project. I’m quite looking forward to the challenge!
Throughout the course of the module we have discussed and read about this idea of the birth of the technological age, and the impact it’s had on the publishing industry. This week, I’ve been thinking about what the author John B.Thompson addresses in chapter 15 of Books in the Digital Age. He mentions this notion of the traditional book being eclipsed by the delivery of content online. Yes, the digital revolution has impacted the world of book publishing, and transformed it, websites such as Project Gutenberg and Lulu shows us this. But in my opinion this is a good thing, as Thompson says, it has given the world of printed books a new lease of life, ‘rendering it potentially immortal’ by providing different revenue streams, for example the backlist. This means that it is now possible to publish books that were once put out of print through publishing companies and websites such as Project Gutenberg storing these books as PDF files in their archives. This means that it is possible to print them on demand. This as Thompson says means that ‘with digital printing, the life of a book can be stretched out indefinitely, as the book can be permanently available’. This is a good thing, as it means that every book ever created is most likely to be available to the public, and that many commentators who predicted the death of the book will be wrong! At least I hope so. What do you think? Do you believe that the death of the book is soon around the corner with the birth of e-books? Leave your comments.
I bid you farewell until next week’s blog. I hope that your publishing attempts go well, and that you have as much fun publishing your own book as I did.
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