Publishing and the New Yorker

So all week I kept hearing about this article that foretold the death of publishing as we know it. I first heard it from an editor at work, then several NYU alumni at our meetup. Each time I made a mental note to Google it as soon as I could and then forgot, given the crazy week I had. So after forgetting it for the third time, I was surprised when my husband pulled our copy of The New Yorker out of the recycling bin (and I have to admit that I didn't even remember that we have a subscription) so that I could read this great article about publishing.

So I read it...Most of what it mentioned I had read about elsewhere to various degrees, and I didn't find it alarming at all. Yes, publishing as we know is is changing, not dying, but what industry can survive so long without evolving? And yes, print may not remain the primary medium for the industry, but that does not mean that it will only be a rare and expensive commodity either. What if instead of POD as a transition, it becomes another option for the consumer? What if the consumer of the future can easily decide which medium he or she prefers to have their content delivered on, and that the price difference is so small, if any, that everyone can afford it all?

I think instead of people worrying about something that will never die, that they embrace the change and the freedom it could eventually give us, both as publishing professionals who won't have to worry about ever-increasing cost of paper and production and as consumers. And if this new model means consumers pay before a book is "produced," whether in print or online, and then cannot return them, than the publishing industry will actually be healthy and strong enough to focus not on cost of goods sold, but on content.