Introduction
In working at my essay, the source that I found most useful for the project is the article titled, The Impact of Digital Books upon Print Publishing, which was written in 2002 by David McAllister, Nancy McAllister and Steve Vivian, and published by Boston Books and CM Online Media Inc.
In this piece of literary work, the authors offer a brief summary of the development of online publication. In this regard, they look into the development and popularization of the internet, upto a time when authors and publishers started placing excerpts of book pages online as marketing strategies (Mc Allister, McAllister and Vivian 1-5).
Main Body
Here McAllister D., McAllister N. and Vivian cite Amazon.com as one of the earliest hosts for book excerpts. In subsequent paragraphs, the authors explain how enterprises that had made it big in print publishing initially refused to acknowledge online publishing as a credible way of carrying on their business.
The author’s go on to point out that over time, and with the growth of internet usage, publishers had no option but to make the switch to online-initially, offering only a few pages of their works and later fully embracing online publications as modern way of marketing their products (Mc Allister, McAllister and Vivian 3).
Towards the close of the article, the authors focus on advancing developments in e-book technology. They analyze the possibility of the popularity of reading tablets going up as years progress before drawing to the conclusion that e-books are here to stay and that it is only a matter of time before readers fully embrace them.
From this point onwards, I shall offer a personal assessment of the points raised by the authors in relation to the assignment for which their work was identified as the most informing source. To this end, I shall analyze what I regard as the strengths and the weaknesses of the articles as well as providing suggestions of what the authors could have omitted while doing this piece.
The article in review has many strengths, top on the list being the fact that the authors did an extensive research on the topic before putting pen to paper. This is well evidenced by the way they track down the inceptive stages of internet popularization and smoothly introduce the reader to the aspect of online publishing before delving into e-books and the hardware for accessing them.
The authors cite numerous and very credible sources to back up the statistical elements that they raise. Going through the article, one realizes that the authors do not just raise unrelated points and then go ahead to try and provide explanations as to why they happened. Instead, they ensure that a consistent flow of ideas is maintained with one assertion being linked to the next.
Another strength of the article is that the authors identify a particular question and then exhaustively analyze without having to deviate from the original discussion. In the preface, they authors confirm that the article will assess the impact of e-books on the print industry. True to their word, the article draws to the conclusion that e-books are gradually replacing printed books and with the rates at which technology is developing, it is only a matter of time before paper books find space in the museums.
While taking the reader to this conclusion, the authors ensure that they clearly illustrate the gradual shifts in phases between one development and the other, by usage of numbers, figures and professional opinions. This just means that for the authors a point is not complete until it has been well substantiated by facts and figures. For instance, in the fourth paragraph, the author illustrates the growth of the internet by rural users between 1998 and 2001 by 24 percent per annum.
The only weakness that can be attributed to the article is that it ends in an unconventional and unstructured way. While reading any piece of what purports to be scholarly work, the author should easily tell that the article is coming to a close. For this article however, the authors do not make the necessary effort to indicate that they are closing their arguments. Instead, the reader finds himself in what can only be described as a dead end.
If I was given the chance to edit this article, I would ensure that the very final paragraph provides an easy to point out relation between the growth of e-books and the downfall of paper books. I would however leave the discussion open for further evaluation because the speculations raised might not necessarily materialize. However, it is only wise to say that there is no written work that can be 100% free of error and it would only be inappropriate to disregard the positives of the article on account of the slight omission.
Conclusion
From this review, it is easy to see why I regarded this article as the most credible reference source for my essay on the impact of e-books on publishing companies. Actually, going through the article has made me more informed and better versed with the concept of online publishing.
Works Cited
Mc Allister, David, Nancy McAllister and Steve Vivian. The Impact of Digital Books upon Print Publishing. Boston Books and CM Online Media Inc. 2002. Web.