The (Culture) Vultures Are Dying

Book Wars

The possibility of parallel imports of books has got Australian publishers spooked. They're campaigning hard to keep the status quo because bottom line, that's where their margins reside. To this end, they've enlisted the likes of Tim Winton to pitch in on the lobbying. The weird thing is, I think Tim Winton might stand to gain something if these changes were to be brought in, not suffer.

I've been told by people that Tim Winton owes it to front for these publishers, which is why he's lending his name to the lobbying effort. I can imagine that, well enough. I can remember when musicians of certain acclaim took to lobbying against parallel imports of CDs, and that didn't really wash either.

The deal that exists at the moment is that parallel imports are not allowed, and Australian publishers have 30days to put out a book that has been published overseas. So let's say Stephen King puts out a new book. The Australian publisher for Stephen King has 30days to print the Australian edition of the book and get it on the market, and in turn, the American edition does not make it on to our shores - unless somebody orders it through Amazon or Barnes and Noble.

What has the publishers irked is that they claim they can't put out the Australian version cheaper than the American or British versions thank to the economies of scale. Therefore they contend that it will be the end of them as publishers of Australian fiction as well.

I've been racking my brains about this a bit because books are interestingly resistant to piracy unlike movies and music. Not that it doesn't exist but it certainly isn't what is going to fell the publishing business as what Piracy has done to music.

The only advantage an Australian publisher would have over an overseas publisher is actually their proximity to Australian writers. You would think that the changes would force them to think of ways to make more money off Australian authors instead. Of course, it's not looking quite that way, and if I can make a character charge against the larger Australian publishers, I'll say this: they haven't exactly been nurturing literature in this nation as well as they would have. In fact they've done a piss poor job for a long time, principally by being lazy and always looking for the safest bets.

Yep, I said. But hey, this is the way this blog is about.

Thus it comes with no surprise that the big publishers don't want changes to the status quo; no, that would mean they'd actually have to go looking for serious talent and invest time in nurturing them and sharing in their risks. You get the feeling that all the big publishers in this country want to do is sell cook books and travelogues instead.

Literature? Forget it.

Just to be sure I asked a small publisher that specialises in poetry - yes, Puncher and Wattman - how all this might affect them and the answer was that it wouldn't. Because they publish Australian poetry, it wasn't as if there were big printing presses in America and UK out to flood the market with competing versions of Australian poetry. And in turn, it's not as if they're going to change their focus from Australian poetry which means the changes aren't going to hit them at all. It sounded like they almost welcomed it.

Then the conversation turned to just how much they were selling and it came down to an interesting observation. Considering how Australians claim to care about Australian culture, it was remarkable how few people actually put their money where their mouths were.

"About 1.5%?" I asked in jest.

1.5% is the market penetration of Australian filmsin the Australian box office. It would surprise me none to find Australian authors have made about the same penetration as their cinematic cousins.