Quote:
Originally Posted by rhadin
Often times the publishers do not have the original electronic files; those files reside with the typesetter.
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Worse: authors wrote long-hand, via typewriter, via word processors and publishers and typesetters have systems incompatible with "older" work. Hands up anyone who can open a Wordstar document created in CPM for Apple ][+ using Gutenberg formating and distribute it today in .awz?
We need to deal with what we have: original clean electronic text or some flavour of OCR or converted text which needs HUMAN proof-reading to create an "eternal" copy. I am sure we agree: once we "get it absolutely right", there is only one
Declaration of Independence. Forever. Well, same for Nero Wolfe, Sam Spade, Hercule Poirot and Sherlock Holmes. There
is an absolute.
So, down the road, what do publishers offer? If not just the accurate text, what else? There is "monetization" of the experience: wrapping up the enthusiasm of Sam Spade admirers into additional commentary, pictures, ideas, riffs on the theme -- attached to the "gospel". But copyright laws currently encourage and reward the lazy: do nothing and earn big bucks decades after the death of the creator thanks to being an ancestor, or ancestral corporation.