COM62704

INTRO TO MASS
COMMUNICATION
LEARNING OBJECTIVES

1. Trace the historical development of print media.

2. Explain current business issues affecting the industries for each
print medium.
3. Outline the financial model for each print medium, including sales,
circulation, readership, and distribution as well as the transition to
digital business models.
 The Beginning of Books

Print media are arguably facing some of the biggest challenges from digital
media, ranging from declines in advertising revenues to changing patterns
of reading among the public.

Representing the beginning of mass communication, print media originated

in the typographical era of the Middle Ages.

Mass forms of mechanical printing and typography contributed to sweeping

social transformation in Europe, including mass literacy and the
Renaissance.
From Books -
Ebooks
• Ancient - Handwritten scrolls using
papyrus plant
• Codex – Roma created using more
durable & compact using parchment
paper and wooden cover. Rise of
Christianity – on the go carry biblical
text
• Introduction of Printing – the oldest
printed book ‘Diamond Sutra’
• Power of Printing – Gutenberg Printing
in 15th century – allowed mass printing
• The first dictionary - Another ‘first’ for
books was the first dictionary, created in
1582 CE by Richard Mulcaster.
 Monastic Scribes

• Until paper arrived from China via the

Middle East in the later Middle Ages,
European scribes wrote on parchment
or vellum made from treated hides of
goats, sheep, or calves.
• Because copying and illustrating by
hand were extremely time-consuming,
and creating parchment was expensive,
books were generally not widespread
before the end of the Middle Ages.
From Books - Ebooks

• Modern bindings – Glued books - From scrolls, to the codex, and

now to glue-bound books . The development of glued books said
“so long” to sewing as this method was quicker and cheaper.
• In 1935 CE, for only six pence each, you could pick up one of
Penguin Books first glued paperbacks
 But what could make printing even more cost
efficient and environmentally friendly at the same
time?

Print-on-demand

In 1970s
From Books - Ebooks

• It was not only print-on-demand that transformed the future of

books but the first digitization of texts by Project Gutenberg in
1971 CE brought reading into the internet era.

• Google Books - In 1996, Google co-founders supported the

Stanford Digital Library Technologies Project and by 2002,
Google Books was officially launched to start digitizing books all
over the world
 Introduction

A government antitrust suit accused

Apple and five major publishers of
colluding to set 2010 prices of eBooks
so no publisher could undercut Apple.

In July 2014, however, without

admitting wrongdoing, Apple agreed to
settle a class-action lawsuit from states
and consumers with a payout of up to
$400 million dollars, subject to further
appeals.

Reference: https://www.reuters.com/article/us-apple-ebooks-idUSBRE9690GE20130710
 Beginnings of Mass Comm & Mass Literacy

The printing press spread scientific discoveries and religious beliefs, some of which
challenged the authority of the Catholic Church.

Many books copied by scribes, especially scientific works, were printed in Latin,
effectively reducing readership to elites educated in the classics.

Printers rapidly discovered that books and broadsheets printed in local common
languages (the vernacular) found an eager audience as more common people learned
to read.

Books had left the quiet monastic scriptoria and entered the bustling commercial world
of printmakers and the average person
Beginnings of Mass Comm & Mass Literacy

Most Europeans and Americans remained illiterate until the nineteenth

century.

In colonial America, education was available largely to the wealthy, who

could afford to hire and house private tutors for their children.

Text- books played a crucial role in the increased public education of the
early 1800s that helped reduce illiteracy among the general population.
Beginnings of Mass Comm & Mass Literacy

1783 - Noah Webster, known

1690 - New England Primer,
today for Webster’s Dictionary,
published initially circa by
wrote A Grammatical Institute of
Benjamin Harris, introduced
children to the English alphabet,
the English Language, a response
to the popular textbooks
the rudiments of reading, and
imported from England that
basic Christian values.
conveyed English cultural values.

Known popularly as the “Blue

1836 - McGuffey Readers became
Back Speller,” Web- ster’s
standard reading books for
textbook provided tutorials on
schoolchildren throughout the
language, religion, morals, and
nineteenth century.
domestic economy.
Advantages of eBooks over Printed Books

1. One Device, Many Books

2. Accessible Everywhere
3. Easy Updates
4. Shareable Content
5. Augmented Reality Experience
6. Easy on the eyes
7. Read Aloud Feature
8. Interactive Elements
9. Environment Friendly Option
10. Affordable in the long run

Reference: https://kitaboo.com/top-10-advantages-of-ebooks-over-printed-books/
 Currents Issues in Books

• First, industry mergers and consolidation enable publishers to increase

profit margins by reducing operating costs associated with warehousing,
marketing, and sales.
• Increased size also means more leverage with dominant retail giants
Barnes & Noble and Amazon.com in negotiations that include obtaining
prominent display locations in bookstores and on the Web.
• Amazon is a competitor for traditional publishing companies, partly
because of its dominance in the independent publishing and eBook
sectors.
• They could not agree on the percentage of sales that a distributor like
Amazon should get; and Amazon’s creation of a subscription model for
eBooks, Kindle Unlimited, also challenged traditional methods of book
sales (and authors’ royalties, leading to many complaints among authors).
 Challenges Faced by
Small and Medium
Publishers Everyday

• Changing Demands
• Inconsistent Revenues
• Digital Disruption
• Lack of Know-how
• Royalty Management
• Increased Competition

Reference: https://kitaboo.com/common-challenges-faced-by-
small-and-medium-publishers/
Sales and
Readership of
Books

Reference: https://wordsrated.com/book-sales-statistics/
Outlook for Books

E-books Audiobooks

Media
convergence Independent
– from books authors
to movie
Further Reading

Google Arts & Culture. (n.d.). A Brief History of Books. Google Arts &
Culture. https://artsandculture.google.com/story/a-brief-history-of-
books/OAXR-SPrQmOCew?hl=en

Zeng, D. (2021, March 19). Is the Publishing Industry Dead in the

Digital Era? Digital Society. https://medium.com/digital-society/is-
the-publishing-industry-dead-in-the-digital-era-157566c80b69