By : Bobbie Bermudez This timeline incorporates what I consider great advancements in both physical book publishing in addition to alternatives such as e-books, online publishing and print on demand.

 The pioneers in internet-based publishers were Boson Books, Hard Sheel Word Factory and Online Originals. They all tested the various formats of e-books including the PDF and DRM. They distinguish themselves form conventional publishers not only because of their digital content, but also because the much higher royalty rates they offer.  Online Originals was the first e-book publisher to win mainstream book reviews (in The Times) and a nomination for a major literary prize (the Booker Prize).The TimesBooker Prize  (  (

 Pioneered by the digital presses of both Cannon and Xerox, digital printing is the reproduction of letterpress and/or digital images on a physical surface.  (  (

 This public audio, video and web content archive was started in October 13,1994 by the Library of Congress. It encourages “academic libraries, museums, historical societies, and archival institutions (with the exception of federal institutions) to digitize American history collections and make them available on the Library’s American Memory site”. By 2000 it had over 5 million items available online.  

 This printing system, also known as publishing on demand, is based on the ideal that a copy of a book is not printed until the book order has been received. Therefore not only is it a more ‘eco-friendly’ way of publishing, it also eliminates the problem of warehousing thousands of book copies indefintly.  (  ( -book-machines-printing-on-demand/) 

 Based on the idea of a soda vending machine, this machine print the digital file of a book and then binds it, creating a physical book in a matter of minutes. It is very similar to the Print on Demand ideal except machine cuts out the publisher and offers the product, or book, directly to the consumer. The first Espresso Book Machine was installed and demonstrated on June at the New York Public Library’s Science, Industry, and Business Library.New York Public Library  ( (

 An access control program used by publishers and copyrights to limit the use and transfer of digital files. More specifically in publishing, DRM is used by publishers to uphold the copyright laws of ebooks.Sony, Apple, Microsoft and BBC are just some of the corporations that employ the use of DRM for their digital content.  (

 A blook is defined as book that is either based on the content of a blog or an online book published via a blog.The first blook was User Interface Design for Programmers, written by Joel Spolsky.It was published by Apress on June 26, 2001, based on his blog Joel on Software.Joel SpolskyJoel on Software  (

 Publisher Lulu.com was founded in 2002 as a technology company that offered diverse publishing services to both businesses and self- published authors. More specifically LuLu.com will advertise your work on their website and make it available to buy on a print on demand basis. They help unpublished and/or aspiring artist gain exposure while still keeping the copyright of their works.   

 A mobile phone novel can loosely be defined as a 1000 to 2000 word chapters sent via text message on mobile phone. They are read using Java based applications. The first MPN was “Deep Love” written by Yoshi in The book’s popularity led to a physical book publishing that sold 2.6 million copies and also a television and movie franchise.  This technology continues to gain momentum in Japan where five out of the ten best selling novels in 2007 were mobile phone novels.   (

 Launched in November 2007 by online bookseller Amazon.com, the Amazon Kindle is not the first e-book however it is one of the most popular. This is due to the fact that it enables content downloads over Amazon Whispernet using the Sprint network. This eliminates the need for a computer connection to download e-books. It is the first of its kind to use E-ink  