Early registration is now open for the 2010 Tools of Change for Publishing Conference returning to the Marriott Marquis Feb. 22-24 2010.
The program for TOC 2010 reflects how quickly the landscape is changing for publishers — digital can no longer be thought of as a separate topic; digital creation, delivery, distribution, consumption, and communication are permeating every layer of the publishing ecology.
This year we’ve tried to include a lot of conversations about and with readers, to encourage discussion about how new formats and modes are shaping preferences and behavior. We’ve also split the popular Lightning Demo sessions into two different components, both now part of the main program. The familiar 5-minute demo format will remain for a dedicated Breakout Session, and as a special Plenary Session, we’ll be using the popular and entertaining Pecha Kucha format, where each speaker gets 20 slides that advance automatically every 20 seconds. We’ve also split several of the tutorials into two 90-minute workshops, rather than the longer 3-hour format.
It’s important to remember that we are still very early in a transition as big or bigger than the shift from manuscript to print as the primary form for books. And it’s useful to look back on that transition for insight into how the apparent shortcomings of the new and uncertain matter little in the long run. From James J. O’Donnell’s essay, The pragmatics of the new: Trithemius, McLuhan, Cassiodorus in The Future of the Book:
Every negative claim made about print [in the 15th century] is correct, and every negative prophecy came true. Take the argument about the likeness of copies making collation and correction impossible: a perfectly valid point. Why did it not derail print in its glorious career? … [T]he system of communication introduced by print was so large, so fast, so powerful, and ultimately such a source of wealth that the defects of the system could be remedied as far as need be. … In short, in the end, the defects of print and the criticisms they drew didn’t matter. This is a lesson worth mulling at length.