"The most current theme in the publishing market is ensuring access to spiritual goods," said Juergen Boss, director of the Frankfurt Book Fair, during the press conference held this Tuesday (8/10).
Boss highlighted the importance of the editor as a political and cultural agent - and the absence of this figure in most digital publications led by the three giants of the digital market (Amazon, Apple and Google).
Among other themes, this year the fair brings a general concern with finding ways to circumvent the control of these three big giants over new consumption habits. This is not exactly about developing digital book reader technologies, but other issues relating to product quality, democratization and access.
"A child can have some change in their pocket, go to a bookstore and buy a physical book. With digital technology, this simplicity in the act of choosing and buying is no longer possible", compared Boos, citing as a basic obstacle the consumer's need to provide a credit card number to be able to create a user account and download/purchase digital books.
Guaranteeing access to spiritual goods (books and other products) would involve strengthening some agents, including the end consumer - who must maintain their selective critical spirit instead of handing it over to a computer that indicates a list of likely interests related to the " user profile" - even governments, who must be aware of the new behavior of the information and book publishing market.
"A new market generates new fears and also new power structures that we need to be aware of. We are no longer a world structured geographically, but in small and large", he said.
Entrepreneurship
Since today, Solisluna Editora is also present in these effervescent discussions at the Frankfurt Book Fair, which continues until Sunday (13/10) with a series of specific events dedicated to Brazilian culture and the Brazilian market, as Brazil is the honored country in 2013.
The publisher displays 24 titles at the Brazilian stand and personally participates in the largest world meeting on book publishing through a team of editors and authors present in Germany, some of them with support from the artistic mobility notice from the Bahia Department of Culture.
For Stephen Smith, CEO of Wiley, a company dedicated to developing information tools of different types, Brazilian editors deserve to be highlighted for their entrepreneurial energy and professionalism. He highlighted that there has been a worldwide drop in the sale of printed books since 2008, caused by many factors (economic crisis, arrival of digital books, etc.) and there is no belief in an immediate recovery. On the contrary: "the digital revolution has arrived and will change our way of thinking."
On the other hand, it will still be a long time before the printed book becomes an outdated technology. There will be coexistence between the two models, in order to reinvent the reading habit. The American quoted a phrase by Monteiro Lobato to calm traditional editors: "The thing that scares the least is the future."
Pavilion dedicated to Brazil
After the press conference, journalists were invited to visit the pavilion dedicated to Brazil in advance, a large welcoming space with hammocks to lie down and listen to Brazilian music, cushions to sit on the floor in front of dozens of books by Brazilian authors translated into other languages and bicycles to virtually cycle through the richness and diversity of Brazil.
Before the tour, Daniela Thomas explained the inspirations of designer Felipe Tassara, from São Paulo, to create the space.
Large panels of fitted pieces of paper, with images of Brazilian book covers, form curves with the symmetry and simplicity of the lines of modernist architecture. "We decided to pay homage to paper, which after all has been a friend of our imagination for more than five thousand years," said Daniela.
Follow more news from Solisluna in Frankfurt on this blog.
