>> Its easy to publish on the Web - but hard to keep a continuity to the
>> literature.
>>
>> Shelly Warwick
>> <swarwick[_at_]way.com>
>
> Proper use of SGML can handle all of these problems. Paper publishing
> has largely moved there, and electronic publishing will have to as
> well. What you are really suggesting is that as more people depend on
> us and our products, we are going to have to act more professionally.
I think it's a bit more difficult than that. SGML *just!* gives you a way of defining parts of a document/document structure and was designed to solve the problems around document interchange (and massive governement projects -- wherein literally millions of pages of techdocs ended up getting rekeyed absurd numbers of times because every contractor seemed to use a different computer publishing system). It has evolved to something more than that but doesn't solve the bigger issues.
A book sits on a shelf. It is physically there. It uses the same access technology (fingers, eyes, and literacy) across many human generations. A web or online stored publication is there only as long as the server is on line. Readers know it is there only for a long as it is available to search. I agree with one of the earlier comments in this thread -- how do create continuity? Do we agree to spend tax dollars to build a central repository, with, as was suggested, the library of congress? What happens to the notion of periodical archives? I know that newspapers don't archive copy of their web editions each day -- they might save ascii versions of the text files in a database but that's another thing from preserving the work as a whole.
While I'm typing here, I also want to note that while print production is certainly not an inexpensive process, electronic publishing has its own set of expenses. And the cost of labor often goes up.
(Formerly with an unmentioned major newspaper entity and various system vendors; currently president of www.projectcool.com) Received on Wed Apr 24 1996 - 01:18:56 GMT
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