Two Canadian e-Publisher Re-invent the Book

There are several Canadian publishers who are using the new technology to push the envelope in area of what is a book. Coach House Books (http://www.chbooks.com) re-invented itself as an electronic publisher four years ago as a just-in-time and on-line publisher with idea of putting as much in digital form as they did in print. As of last year they have secured grants from the Canada Counsel and the Ontario Arts Counsel. They are also working with the Ontario Spoken and Electronic Word Counsel. They have since become a full member of the Literary Press Group and have re-established the print side of the operation. It is the only press in the world with its full front list on-line. Coach House Books has a different notion as to what electronic publishing should be and how to go about it. With Internet access becoming faster and access nearly ubiquitous, Darren Wershler-Henry asks, "Why would anyone want to download anything at all. If you want it, you just turn on your computer and it's there. Downloading implies replicatability and we're not particularly interested in making things for people to run off on their laser printer." Coach House Books is not only concerned about unauthorised copies of their publications but of the quality of the reproductions that might be made. Coach House Books idea of publishing on-line is not to just take content and make it available in a different container. According to Darren Wershler-Henry publishing on-line is about how the Internet can add to the experience of reading, by using graphics, sounds and animation. "Fidget" by Kenneth Goldsmith is an example of stretching the envelope. It was commissioned by the Whitney Museum in New York City as a performance piece. It an eight hour long Java Applet that builds a poem in front of the reader out of the text. Another example of the use of technology is Damien Lopez's "Sensory Deprivation". It is a collection of visual poetry takes the control away from the user as it moves from image to image. Coach House Books sees the substance and presentation of the book to be equal to the content. Coach House Books used to produce an annual anthology of its works for institutions on CD ROM but as the collection grew it and more books were published each year, it became no longer viable because of the ceiling price that can be asked for CD

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