Richard Nash on Revaluing the Book

Flickr photo by jessamyn

"I’m tremendously optimistic about the future of the book as an object. I think the worst years of the book as an object have been the last 50 years," said Richard Nash, founder of the new experimental publishing community Red Lemonade and former head of leading independent publisher Soft Skull Press. In an interview with Matt Runkle for the Boston Review, the provocative Nash explains how new media can offer choices to readers that were impossible under the old corporate publishing model and that the traditional book will remain an option if enough readers want it. Nash asks -- "Why do we think that a person won’t buy a print book because in theory they could read it for free online? What is it that people are buying? What is it that people want? In many respects what people want is to read it on their own terms, so in many cases, people don’t want to have to read it on a screen."

To read the full Boston Review interview with Nash click here

Here's more -- "Richard Nash: Publishers Have Lost Their Way, Becoming Printers and Distributors Rather Than Matchmaker." Nash in video interview with Paul Carr of TechCrunch. June 15th, 2011.