“The liveliest of corpses”: trends and challenges for the future in the book publishing industry

Reviews the perceived and actual threats to the book publishing industry arising from electronic storage, management and distribution of information. It argues that publishing has always been primarily a content‐management industry and if not entirely free from technological obsolescence, it has at least been relatively insulated from its worst effects by concentrating on the maintenance of quality and authority of the information it provides. Greater challenges may arise from other quarters, Including globalisation, threats to intellectual property regimes, and changes in retailing and distribution, and publishers must think about the impacts of these on their businesses.