gained enough ‘clout’ for their work, but another person uses their idea and happens to be better at articulating it or creating a better plot. Without a copyright in place and the difficulty in which it is to trace the original work online authors and publishers face a huge challenge.

Due to all these advanced pieces of technology, the publishing industry has advanced and developed. Where in the past everything had to be printed on paper and all distribution, marketing and editing happened by hand and through word of mouth, now technology allows a quicker process. Since the rise and key role that the internet plays in our current lives and society, there has been an increase in digital publishing. Greco claims that “print is dead, replaced by innovative enriched digital products that contain “text” and audio and video.”
(Greco, Milliot and Wharton, 2014) By this he is referring to the vast growth of the digital industry and how this may be the future of publishing. ‘n the last ten years there has been a ‘decline in physical book sales in the UK by 6% while digital book sales have risen a whopping 305%.’ (Publishers.org.uk, 2014) This has led to the digital disruption that the publishing industry is currently facing.

With digital publishing there are four stages within the development process. The first being operating systems and control, then digital production methods. Third is customer and marketing initiatives and finally digital products. (Thompson, 2005) In terms of distribution there is a clear correlation with the huge rise of sales of e- books compared to physical copies. This is mostly to do with how much easier it is for readers to have access to e- books. As well as the fact more authors are turning away from the traditional publishing approach and becoming self- published and online. Bhaskar n his work outlines that in current society ‘everyone is or can be a publisher on the internet.’ (Bhaskar, 2013) Though not all may be good, the internet is a platform where anyone can share their work. Thanks to digital printing, it has become much easier to publish books and far quicker. From one input (a manuscript) there can be multiple outputs (paperback and hardback books, e-books) these e-books can be further developed into multiple formats to be compati