With the overwhelming amount of online media these days, I can’t help but wonder, how does it benefit or destroy the ordinary publishing industry we’ve always had? Today, I’m going to take iPad as an example to discuss on the dramatic impacts.
With the rising popularity of Apple’s iPads, there are more and more media arising that is compatible with such platform. It has even become a must-have study tool for many grade schools and high schools in Sydney. Many people say it has replaced the conventional textbooks, is it true though?
In the long history of publishing, humans have relied on the method/ technology of jotting down the ideas and process them with machines into papers or hand written on blackboards or other medium. However, facilitated by iPad, more and more publishers follow the trend of e-publications, that is, publishing online instead of actual printing. for example, instead of printing massive piles of exercises, teachers are now giving out the mathematical equations on students’ prescribed exercise application on their iPads. This is not a voluntary thing like it used to be when I was in high school anymore, it is a rather compulsory task. Each student has to pay for their own iPad with specific applications installed by the schools (at least it’s what they do in private schools). Student jot notes on their iPad, read texts and revise on their iPad, even produce their essays on it. The ordinary readers in the past have in fact become e-readers and e-writers.
This is not only happening in the education world, it is also the similar case in the commerce and business world. With the technology of iCloud – a program of Apple which enables 3G transmitting of data across time and space, officers tend to read documents and produce the respective PowerPoints or minutes for a meeting on their iPads. One minor adjustment done on their iPad, the next minute, it will be updated on their Mac laptop by iCloud. The same goes for newspaper, magazines and other publications.
So how has this transformation impacted on the publishing industry? Is it good or bad? Well, it’s a bit of the both. Undoubtedly, with the abundance of online publishing, like news status or articles shared on Facebook, news update on ABC.com, copies of Harry Potter on Kindle; there is a smaller demand for print media. But there is one thing that we cannot neglect: the need for print media will always be there. When we go to work in the morning, we would still want to quickly grab a copy of MX just to have a good laugh. When we are in uni, we would still want to take a copy of Blitz instead of actually going online and check out what’s new. Personally, I’d much rather buying books than reading e-books. 1. It hurts my eyes if I stare at the screen for too long, 2. I love the feeling an actual book gives me (the smell of fresh paper, the flickering of each page, the drawings and foldings that I can do to personalised my book), 3. If I were to spend half the price to get an e-book I might as well spend the full price or either pirate it or not read at all. I would also prefer to buy glossy magazines that sometimes come with little gifts because it is simply irreplaceable by e-magazines.
Even though the media landscape has largely been prioritised to the online platform, there is always this share kept for print media. It is not necessary a bad development for the conventional media, not to mention most media has already started their online empire….
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