POD and Novel Update

First, the novel update. I just finished going through chapter 26, which puts me at page 137 of 207 in the editing process. Seventy pages to go.

Next, I've been looking at what might be the future of the publishing industry. Let's first look at the basic idea of how it happens now. When a book is published, it is usually printed in a large quantity called a print run. For a new author that could be 3,000 copies. Maybe more maybe less, but about that amount. The books get released to stores like Barnes and Nobles and Borders where they compete for shelf space. Maybe some will get bought. Maybe all will. If all get bought, then the publishing company will print another run of books. Maybe it will be the same amount, or more, depending on how well the first set sold. A lot of times, especially for new authors, most of the books won't get sold. Even for best-selling authors some copies won't sell. So, what happens to all those extras? Sometimes the store will sell them at a reduced price. Often enough, though, the books get sent back to the publisher. See, the publishers have a deal with the bookstores that they will buy back any unsold copies at the same price the bookstore bought them for. So, now they have a bunch of books they paid to print that they can't do anything with. So, even for successful authors, there's some loss. For new authors there will probably be substantial loss (this is why publishers are hesitant to take on new authors).

Well, there's a few technologies and new business models out there that could solve some of this. It's basically called Print on Demand (POD). It works in a few ways. Here's two:

• Online sellers like Amazon take an order for a book. When they get that order, they print the book themselves at their own plant. Then they send the book to the buyer. The buyer doesn't know that Amazon printed it and they don't notice any delay in getting the book. They have a book they can read, but there's no waste. A buyer wanted a book, Amazon printed the book, no extras were printed.
• Or, a retail store has books on display. You see a book you like, you read a little of it and decide to buy it. You take the display book to the register and pay for it. They start a printing process where they print the book on site. Four minutes later, you have your book, with no waste. The only waste is the display book, which the store can sell when they decide not to carry it anymore. The most waste would be one book per store.

It works for online shoppers and it works for people who like to go to the store and peruse the book. It works for publishers that no longer have to print the book, they just send a text file to each store where they print when someone wants it. It works for the author because there's less cost to produce the book. It works for new authors because there's less risk in publishing new authors.

Now, the company I saw that builds the machines that can print a book in four minutes sells them for $50,000 a pop, so that's a sizable investment. But then, to stock a store with thousands of books costs as much and probably more, right? There's only two of those printers in the world now (one in DC and one in Egypt), but wouldn't that revolutionize the business? In an age where fewer people are reading, wouldn't it be great to streamline the process? I'm hoping something like this is in the near future.