Blockchain could disrupt the publishing industry in several ways:
- Creating censorship resistant platform that puts decision making power in the hands of the end-users – Animal Farm was rejected by at least 4 publishers; and Kipling’s English was so heavily criticized that it seemed The Jungle Book would never see the light of day. Stephen King had had to publish his The Running Man under a pseudonym before the world realized there is an audience for his strange tales of the supernatural. And there are so many examples that we will never find out about because they were rejected due to the centralized decision making and biased opinion.
- Authorship rights and plagiarism – Each content author will be the main proprietor of their work. Rights holdings will be at disposal, without any central authority meddling. The source of content will be easily authenticated because the information about where, when, and who published the original material will be available.
- Content monetization – It brings new opportunities for monetization models, through cheap and fast micro-transactions we can put the end-users in the focus and adjust business models to their needs, enabling readers to purchase only specific part of the book they really need.
- Ancillary project management – Building fair and transparent system means that anyone included in the project, be it a publisher, translator, or a lector has earned their right to receive praise and compensation for their contribution.
