Abstract
The variety of opportunities offered by the internet makes it attractive for publishing, especially for developing nations previously unable to distribute publications on a global scale. However, Nigerian publishers striving to seize the moment are grossly under-reported in literature, notwithstanding that their innovations could create opportunities globally. This study, therefore, describes the progression of e-publishing in Nigeria with emphasis on e-publishing capacity building, collaboration, and outsourcing. Data were collected from publishers and their websites by means of in-depth interviews, website observation, and survey, and findings indicate that publishers are building e-publishing capacity by launching websites, e-book clubs, online bookshops, and e-libraries in schools and by collaborating with foreign e-book distribution firms. This study, therefore, provides updated information on an emerging market with huge investment and collaboration potential.
TopBackground: E-Publishing And Collaboration Trends
E-collaboration among firms, individuals or groups engaged in a common publishing task, or related tasks using electronic technologies, is evolving. And publishers engage in e-collaboration in several ways, including the use of blogs, wikis, portals, groupware, calendar sharing, discussion boards, document synchronization, cloud storage, video conferencing, white boards and instant messaging. These online collaboration tools help publishers to collectively author, edit, and review materials in a group work space irrespective of distance or location, while supporting easy management of projects and exchange of workflows in the haste to meet deadlines (Malik, 2021). Publishers are also increasingly deploying easy-to-use solutions such as IBM Workplace, Slack or Box Asana and Atlassian Confluence, thereby allowing organizations to maximize employee productivity by offering either a complete or a customized collaboration platform (Genius Project.com, 2022).
E-collaboration tools and applications are increasingly becoming important in all walks of life including collaborative and distributive publishing research (International Resources Management Association, 2018; Juan, A.A. et al., 2012) crisis management communication (Zhao, 2022) and to gain competitive advantage in challenging times such as the world has seen since 2019 (Zhao, 2021). E-publishers, therefore, have numerous reasons (including content creation, content supplies and new product development) to seek e-collaboration solutions for (Hall, 2020). Studies suggest that publishers and their intermediaries collaboratively aggregate supply and demand in ways that streamline the market for providers and consumers (O’Leary, 2014) implying that the scope of e-collaboration is gradually getting wider with respect to publishing. E-collaboration has also been deployed for entrepreneurship training and capacity building as well as in adapting, implementing and pilot-testing of co-innovation platforms, and for the facilitating of venture capital for start-ups (Osmani et al, 2020).
Key Terms in this Chapter
Open Educational Resources (OER): Refers to all teaching, learning and research materials in the public domain, or materials that have been released under an open license, with no restriction or limited restrictions, permitting no-cost access, use, adaptation, and redistribution by others.
E-Publishing Capacity Building: Refers to the process of developing and strengthening the skills, instincts, abilities, processes, and resources that publishing firms need to survive, adapt, and thrive in in the information age.
Publishing E-Collaboration: Is collaboration, conducted without face-to-face interaction among individuals or members of a virtual publishing team using information and communication technologies.