Beginning the "StartwithXML: Why and How" project

Mike Shatzkin
September 12, 2008 | Permalink | Comments (4) | Listen

Today we start an exciting new industry research and education project: "StartwithXML: Why and How."

No publisher of any size or scope can be beyond the XML conversation that is now taking place across the industry. That content must be kept in a repository of XML files has become common understanding. And all the content-generation tools we use -- Word and InDesign and PDF prominently among them -- enable an XML export, so publishers are finding they can create a post-production XML'd version of their content for their archive.

That alone is necessary, but not by itself sufficient, to achieve even the first goal of making conversion -- to a different book output like large-print or to the Web or to any of many ebook formats -- cheap and easy. You can use Word or PDF to get to XML, but without the discipline of a StartwithXML workflow, you will often -- usually -- get an output that working with XML discipline wouldn't have allowed you to create. If you don't apply the discipline, the XML output doesn't solve your problem. And even if it did, it only scratches the surface of what XML can potentially offer to publishers in getting them closer to new revenues and cutting costs.

The "StartwithXML" project will explore all the issues of moving to a StartwithXML workflow through interviews and case studies with publishers and with the channel partners they will be working with to reach new readers in new ways. We'll be looking at what benefits can come to a publisher today from working this way, and what important steps to the future are enabled for those doing this (and cut off from those who don't.)

I am introducing the project this morning (Friday, 12 September 2008) at the BISG Annual Meeting. That talk covers the who, what, why, when, and how. The discussion will be continuing in this space from now.

Tags: startwithxml

4 Comments

bowerbird said:
September 12, 2008 5:16 PM

> No publisher of any size or scope
> can be beyond the XML conversation
> that is now taking place across the industry.

i disagree.

the "xml conversation" (what a cute expression!)
is simply a trick by the dinosaurs to try to
raise the cost of entry for new publishers...

we mammals know we need to be able to maneuver.
it's our quickness and flexibility that makes us
superior to dinosaurs and their bloated formats.

-bowerbird

Robin Tobin said:
September 17, 2008 5:15 AM

Really like this project and ethos but would like to see the conversation extended beyond the content itself.

Most of the publishers I deal with however (particularly trade publishers) have as their primary experience of XML their Onix feeds that go out to their trading partners. They are now starting to use these more and more for populating their websites and generating their catalogues etc. Anyway, just thought was worth a mention.

Wrote a post on here if anyone interested - http://snowbooks.com/onixcentral/blog/

Brian O'Leary said:
September 17, 2008 9:45 AM

Robin - thanks for your observation as well as the link to your post. You're right that Onix is an established and ongoing example of how publishers use XML, and we include in in our research paper as an example of what publishers are already doing with XML (even if it is not always seen as such).

The initial announcement and subsequent posts here are just part of the project description. If you have a moment, take a look at the outline of the research report, which you can access from the site's home page. While the outline is a work in progress, it may help show how we are considering both history and projected use of XML.

Robin Tobin said:
September 18, 2008 4:22 AM

Many thanks Brian for this will download.

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