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Broadcast
15th March 2000
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STEPHEN
KING PUBLISHES LATEST STORY EXCLUSIVELY ON INTERNET
Old-style book publishers are seeing the potential of putting books
into cyber-space.
Stephen King persuaded Simon and Schuster, his publishers in the United
States, to put his 65-page story called Riding the Bullet on the internet.
Rodney Smith talked to Adam Rothberg of Simon and Schuster about the
enterprise and asked him how the project had come about and whether
it would work:
"We were approached by one of Stephen’s associates and
we were all too eager to accommodate when we heard the substance of
the idea. We
have been getting an incredible response from both electronic endors
and our web-site traffic has tripled since we announced this and we
think that this project is really going to take off.
Rodney
Smith mentioned how Stephen King's books sold very, very well, but
he wanted to know how well they sold to find out what the yardstick
was against which they were going to measure this new venture.
"There
is no real yardstick against which we are going to measure this
because it is totally in the category of a grand experiment. To
date the market for electronic books has been very, very, very small
- minuscule in comparison to what our average Stephen King book
sells over its lifetime. So we are all taking a leap into the void
here."
Rodney
Smith wanted to know that would happen to all the people who did
not have computers. Would the producers still produce this latest
Stephen King story in book form?
Adam Rothberg
said they had no plans to do that, so Rodney Smith asked for one
concrete
reason why anybody would want to carry an electronic notepad in
their pocket rather than a paperback book.
"It
it’s multi-function. Not only could it be a calendar and your notebook,
but you could carry seven or eight different book titles on it.
You can hook up to the internet, get your news, get your stock quote
if that is what you are interested in, or get the latest sport’s
score - and read as well."
If it did
take off, what would Adam Rothberg expect to happen then? Rodney
Smith asked.
"I
think that a lot of people will be watching this to see how it does
work and it is going to affect publishing on a number of levels.
The volume of electronic books published could increase but it could
also change the nature of what publishers consider a book".
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This venture could change the nature of what publishers consider
a book.
Adam
Rothberg
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