The book and the challenges of the new age: innovations in the management of the publishing structures Текст научной статьи по специальности «СМИ (медиа) и массовые коммуникации»

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Лъчезар Георгиев

Книга и вызовы нового века: инновации в менеджменте издательских структур

Анализ состояния современного книжного дела. Вызовы издательскому делу электоронной книгой. Деятельность крупнейших европейских издательств в новых условиях.

Ключевые слова: издание, издательство, книга, периодика, печать, распространение

Lychezar Georgiev

The book and the challenges of the new age: innovations in the management of the publishing structures

Analysis of modern book publishing. Calls elektoronnoy book publishing. Activities of the largest European publishers in the new environment.

Keywords: edition, publishing, books, periodicals, printing, distribution

Today's global world has forced us to conform with factors which, only a decade ago, would have seemed impossible and inconceivable. Until the 1980's, for example, British publishing business was concentrated in the UK and was owned, for the most part, by British people. The big global market, however, was open to it and it gradually deployed worldwide thanks to its growing popularity and the traditional communication network with the former colonies and the other English-speaking countries, to reach the figure of 40 percent of export of its book production, in the conditions of severe competition from US publishers. In order to cope in the face of severe competition resulting form conglomeration and globalization, the publishing business started a process of consolidation and creation of a new type of corporations. Some of these were within the UK, as was the case with the merger of the British publishing houses Penguin and Longman into the Pearson Group, which now incorporates a number of publishing houses and newspapers.

For the most part, however, the new global corporations are US based. It is in the United States that the biggest mergers and acquisitions take place. One such example is the Time Warner Corporation which incorporates publishing houses vulnerable to economic downturns, but is practically dominated by the powerful worldwide internet provider America On-Line (AOL). The German Bertelsmann Group acquired the American publishing house Random House, which was founded in the 19th century. The famous US publishing house Harpers, when it merged with the British publisher Collins, formed a new publishing structure HarperCollins, owned by Rupert Murdoch's multinational News Corporation, which is considered to be a vertically integrated global media hold-

ing company illustrating the globalized nature of publishing industry. Murdoch's company spans not only newspapers and magazines, but also film production, satellite and cable TV broadcasters. Some traditional family businesses in publishing have opted to keep their trade name as a symbol of reliability and trustworthiness in the field of publishing, but ownership of their business has gone into quite unexpected structures. Such is the case with the Macmillan publishing business, which was founded in 1843 and the family name has been preserved in some 16 subsidiaries worldwide, while the company itself is owned by the German family corporation Verlagsgruppe Georg von Holtzbrinck. The structure incorporates companies specialized in different thematic areas, e. g. Pan Macmillan offers fiction and documentaries for children and adults; Palgrave Macmillan specializes in publishing academic and university editions in the sphere of humanities and business studies; Macmillan Education is specialized in publishing teaching materials and textbooks in English as a foreign language, as well as other educational materials; Publishing Services is a company dealing in distribution and sale of books and periodicals, information products and electronic editions; and, finally, Nature Publishing Group focuses on publishing scientific journals and reference books in the sphere of medicine, science and technical studies.

The inevitable commercialization of publishing business is another new challenge on a global scale. On the one hand, the author loses his original significance in the new reality of consolidated global publishing, giving way to the literary agent, who looks after his interests and negotiates on his behalf with the multinational companies on issues related to basic and additional royalties for subsequent editions, filming, translations into other languages, reprints in periodicals, etc. In the new corporate environment, however, commercialization reflects on the accuracy of the editorial work. The constant rush to accomplish tasks interferes with the quality of the editorial work and even overrides the work of the editor - the theme lines of yesterday and the ideas of well-edited text have given way to the effects of visual communication. The policy in respect to the publishing repertoire has changed too. There is a marked preference for editions that sell quickly - textbooks and handbooks for studying foreign languages (mainly the most popular European languages), biographies of famous public figures, best-selling novels, and juvenile literature by popular authors.

Mergers and commercialization have affected book trade as well. The bigger publishing houses rely on contacts with wholesalers, offering greater rebates for quick and secure revenues without delay. There is an increase in the sale of cheaper paperback books which sell quickly right after publication. A new style of selling books was invented among retailers. Tim Waterstone opened his own bookshop in London in 1982, starting a new style in book sale - his bookshop is well-lighted, spacious, customer-friendly, and the staff are young, energetic shop-assistants, willing to provide profuse information on every book that is on sale. The merchandise is offered in attractive form. The traditional approach in selling paperback and hardcover books is obliterated in the

name of the reader. Following the innovations in marketing thinking, the bookshops have turned into an important and indispensable part of the big trade centers, while the name Waterstone has become a byword and is even used as a logo in the bookshops and stores of the United Kingdom and the other English-speaking countries. In the 1980's new bookstore outlets appeared, which tried to compete with the long-established WH-Smith bookstores, which sold stationery, newspapers, magazines and limited numbers of books. The assortment of items was later diversified with DVD and audio recordings. With the appearance of new bookstores, the competitive environment brought new types of offers - stimulating regular customers with price discounts, offering three books for the price of two, discounts for members of book clubs set up by the more established publishing houses, special price promotions, etc. The global trend is for family publishers to give way to the modern corporate structure of business in which holdings are set up, professional management takes over, and the mechanisms of modern marketing, advertising and PR communications are used in book publishing and trade.

In the era of commercialism, advertising approaches are essential. The investment made in advertising and promotional activities by the British publishing house Simon & Schuster (which was founded in 1924) forced them to continue publishing books intended for the general public. By the late 1930's Dick Simon and Max Schuster had already founded the publishing house Pocket Books in partnership with the American publisher Robert Fair de Graaff. The large print-run editions of paperback novels consolidated their market positions in the time right after World War One, when the company was acquired by Marshal Field. Following Field's death, his heirs sold the company back to its previous owners. The company went through a number of metamorphoses of publishing partnerships and expansions until it was acquired by the international corporation Gulf & Western. Other acquisitions of companies followed, one of which was the publishing giant Macmillan Publishing Group in 1994. A new restructuring followed under the name of Paramount Communications, and in 1998 it became part of the structure of the international publishing corporation Viacom, under whichit published a diverse repertoire of electronic and paper books aimed at readers from dozens of countries around the world. The editions ranged from fiction and teen books to business publications, preserving the traditional approach of massive advertising of the published products.

Academic and scientific book publishing in Europe and the United States also followed new trends in its development. An illustrious example from the United Kingdom is presented by the two centuries-old publishing houses Oxford University Press and Cambridge University Press.

Oxford University Press's annual output is 4500 published titles, which are sold not only in the United Kingdom, but in dozens of English-speaking countries throughout the world. It has offices in over 50 countries and provides employment for over 3700 specialists in the sphere of English publications and printed communications. Its repertoire includes textbooks, handbooks, and monographs on all subjects taught at the university,

as well as Bibles, art books, children's books, English textbooks for foreigners, business publications, reference books, dictionaries, journals, etc. The editorial process involves strict monitoring and control over publications, especially academic writings. The applications from authors are discussed at the regular meetings of delegates elected from the circles of the academic community whose job is to plan and control the published production. Once an application is approved, the author is offered to sign a contract and start working on the material. The finished manuscript is evaluated by a delegate and there is a discussion with other specialists in the respective field. The remarks and comments are discussed with the author and editor, and the text is thus improved and corrected prior to going into production. The publishing house makes a profit of 9 million pounds a year, 30 percent of which goes into the university. As it functions within the structure of the university, Oxford University Press is treated as a charity organization and is therefore tax exempt. The profit is reinvested and offered as a contribution to Oxford University funds. The publishing establishment is equipped with a high-tech printing facility deploying the newest printing innovations. The internet edition of the Oxford dictionary, the electronic journals which are available online and the CD ROM editions have gained popularity in recent years. It is no wonder that Oxford University Press has firm positions and a significant share in academic publishing in the United States.

The other major publishing house - Cambridge University Press, is another hightech publishing-printing establishment with an impressive international team of authorized editors in Cambridge, New York, the Californian city of Stanford, Cape town, Melbourne, Sao Paulo in Brazil, the Far East cities of Tokyo, Seoul, Hong Kong, Taipei, Bangkok. The publishing house has a state-of-the-art printing facility equipped with both traditional (lithography and copper engraving) and modern technologies such as digital printing in cooperation with the world-famous IBM company, which has supplied a modern printing system incorporating digital technologies in the management of the typographic and printing processes. Besides, the printing facility has a workshop for the manual binding of Bibles, hardbound books and leather cases, crafted with precision, style and fine artistic taste.

There is also a very well organized marketing network in dozens of countries throughout the world. Cambridge University Press editions are in the sphere of humanitarian and public studies, natural sciences, specialized books, about 150 journals - published on behalf of the London Mathematical Society, the Physiological Society, the Zoological Society of London, the British International Studies Association, etc., and their on-line equivalents. In parallel with this, Cambridge University Press publishes dozens of English textbooks and handbooks, educational editions for the elementary and secondary school, college and university books, textbooks and other study materials. A significant and lucrative share of the production is the publication of bibles. Among the most popular editions are those dedicated to the arts and history, e. g.: Cambridge Studiesin Early Modern History; Freedom: A Documentary History of Emancipation - about the

transition period from slavery to the liberation of the Southern American Provinces in 1861-1867; Masterpieces of Western Art;the Cambridge books on History of Art; the Cambridge Film Classics series; Contemporary Artists and Their Critics series; the Cambridge Music Lessons series;theAdventures in Music series, etc. The wide spectrum of publications of Cambridge University Press is a very good example of a diverse and well-organized structure incorporating different forms of printed communications, which builds a prestigious image of the publishing establishment.

One of the most solid publishers of science and popular science editions - House of Elzevir was founded as far back as the late 16th century. The founder of this family publishing house, which gained popularity through its long family history, is the Dutchman Lodewijk Elzevir, who settled in 1580 as a book seller in the University of Leiden -the first Dutch university foiunded just five years prior to that. The work of Lodewijk Elzevir was continued by his sons Matthijs and Bonaventura, and later by his grandsons Isaac and Abraham. In 1620 Isaac Elzevir became the official publisher and printer for Leiden University, a position the family held until the early 18th century. The publishing house was noted for its unique esthetic layout and presentation of the books which it published in ancient Greek, Latin, Dutch, French and Arabic. Among its published editions, we need to mention the works of antiquity (Aristotle and Vergilius), the thoelogic works of Catholicism (Albertus Magnus), the works of Reformation (Calvin), and books by outstanding thinkers of the time such as Galileo Galilei, Erasmus Roterodamus, Ma-chiavelli, Grotius, Descartes, John Locke. A very successful collection for the time was the Republics collection, which comprises small-format volumes, each one of which deals with the geography of a country, its inhabitants, economy, governments and history. The collection was translated into many languages and was successfully sold not only in the European countries but also in the colonies. The Elzevir books are distinguished with the diversity of logos. One such logo bears the motto Non Solus, and uses a symbol from antiquity, adopted by Isaac Elzevir - Lodewijk' grandson. In the early 18th century the family publisher Elzevir ended its activity, but in 1880 a publishing association was founded in Roterdam, which assumed the motto Non Solusas well as the traditions and trade name of Elzevir. Among the first publications of the new company were scientific and literary periodicals, pocket editions, a Dutch encyclopedia by Winkler Prins and adventure novels by Jules Verne in Dutch. By the end of World War II, the company had expanded the range of its publishing interests and specialized in the edition of professional and Enlish-language scientific journals. In 1980 it received the award of the Dutch national press for high achievements in the sphere of spoken and written education. Besides the Dutch-language editions, after the 1980's, the Elzevir Group steadily boosted their market share in the English-speaking countries. A wide repertoire of professional and business publications was offered in the United States, and in March of 1991, the company secured good positions on the American market when it bought the British office of the Oxford publisher Pergamon Press. The long-standing presence of Elzevir and

its successor Elzevir Group in the world of publishing is an example of asserting strong traditions in the sphere of printed communications at an ever faster rate of growth and prosperity, going far beyond the boundaries of Dutch book publishing, and finding their rightful place in the big family of scientific and professional English-language publishing community.

Universities, which officially do not do publishing business, have found a way to publish using state university funds granted for scientific and research projects, or the funding provided under different EU programs.

In the heart of Europe, small European towns become hubs of scientific and university publishing activity. An example of such a town is the university town of Leuwen, not very far from the European capital Brussels. The university center, which attracts thousands of students, houses offices of the powerful publishing group Wolters Kluwer andthe world-famous publisher of science and popular science literature Peeters. The Antwerp publisher Standard is present with a well-arranged Standaard Boekhande-loutlet. The picture of scholarly publishing is completed with the publishing formation ACCO (Academic Cooperative) founded in 1960, which specializes in the publishing of academic literature - textbooks, teaching materials, monographs, which are presented on Dutch-language book markets and at the prestigious Frankfurt Book Fair. ACCO functions as a well-organized publishing-printing complex with its own printing facility and a good marketing and distribution network for the published production. Its board of managers comprises both publishing specialists and members of the academic community at Leuwen University - teaching staff and students who own shares of the Academic Cooperative.

The Italian Mondadori is one of Europe's top publishing companies. The Mondadori publishing complex, located in the Segrate suburb in the industrial area of Milan, occupies an impressive five-storey building in the form of a parallelepiped. A beautiful lake and the undulating architectural constructions of the surrounding buildings make up the exterior of one of the world's top publishing complexes. Its founder Arnoldo Mondadori began his work as a printer and publisher in 1907 in the village of Ostiglia, region of Lombardy. He published his first magazine Luce (Light) when he was only eighteen years old. His intention was to attract the attention of the young people from the rural regions, and thus he started the juvenile series La Lampada (The Lamp). During the war he published magazines for the soldiers on the frontlines. By 1919 Edizioni Mondadori had already established its business in Milan, and had set up a printing house in Verona. He published Italian classics, and outstanding contemporary Italian authors like Luigi Pirandello, Grazia Deledda, Giovanni Verga, Giovanni Pascoli. He also worked with Gabriele D'Annunzio and purchased copyrights. Among his other publications we need to mention the Romantica series (1931) under the editorship of Giuseppe Antonio Borgese. Enciclopedia dei Ragazzi (Children's Encyclopedia), whose major topics were geography, history, music, literature and science, was released in 1922. From 1929, he started pub-

lishing IlGiallo Mondadori - a very popular Italian series of mystery and crime novels. In 1935 he signed a contract with the American company Walt Disney and consequently published dozens of children's books. He also started the series Omnibus Fantastica, followed by Margaret Mitchell's novel Gone with the Wind. The following year he launched the first weekly women's fashion and design magazine Grazia, which is today published in 16 countries around the world, Bulgaria included. Between 1939 and 1945 he issued the news magazine Tempo. For a short time during the war, the headquarters of the publishing house were moved to the town of Arona, after his initial headquarters in Milan had been requisitioned at the time of the German occupation. After he regained his property, Arnoldo took advantage of the mass-scale Marshall plan for economicrecov-eryinpost-war Europe, and expanded his printing technology equipment with machines for printing newspapers and magazines.

The publishing house picked up speed in post-war years with the literary series Biblioteca Moderna Mondadori (1948); in 1950 he started issuing the heavily-illustrated Epoch magazine, while at the same time building upon the science fiction line with the series Urania. In 1962 he launched another magazine - Panorama, which is considered to be the first news magazine in the new Italian print history. 1969 marks the beginning of a new series of world classic writers under the name of Meridiani. The authors included in this series were all well-established, e. g. Hemingway, Sartre, Remark, Montale, etc. In 1949 Mondadori opened his first overseas branch in New York, and in the 1950's, he set up a chain of company bookstores and offices all over the world. His death in 1971 put an end to a period of fast growth and stability for the publishing house. The management of the company was taken up his son Giorgio Monadory; between 1991 and 2002 at the head of the publishing house was his nephew Arnoldo Mondadori. After Arnoldo's death in 2002, in February of the same year, the management was taken up by Marina Berluskoni - the daughter of the former Italian Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi. In 1976 the publishing house started issuing La Republica magazine, which is one of the most influential printed media in Italy nowadays. In 1998, the first Italian information megacenter called Mondadori Informatica Multicenter was opened in Milan. The new image of the present-day big publishing corporation is made up by the multi-storey bookstore offering books, magazines and previous editions, situated on Piazza del Du-omo, along with other book centers and modern marketing structures throughout the country (Mondadori Franchising bookstore included) and the acquisition of the distribution network Gulliver in 1998. Since 1999, the company has worked in cooperation with the global media companies Bertelsmann and Hurst Publishers. In the early 1990's the two companies Mondadori Group and Bertelsmann Group founded a consortium with a view of publishing the very popular monthly magazine Focus. This decade witnessed the issuing of other magazines as well - the teen magazine Top Girl, the IT magazine Jack, as well as the newereditions of Focus Extra, Focus Junior, Focus Storia, Focus Pico, Focus Geo, etc. In 2000 the Hurst Mondadori Consortium was founded in collaboration

with Hurst Corporation. This new consortium specialized in the publication of the Italian version of the Cosmopolitan. The beginning of the new millennium was marked by the foundation of another consortium - Mondadori Rodale (a joint venture of the Italian publisher and the American Rodale Press) with the idea of issuing a monthly magazine Starbene, and the Italian version of Men's Health magazine.

The traditional book publishing business is concentrated in the Books Department of Mondadori Group, under the leadership of the General Manager Gian Arturo Ferrari. Mondadori Books work along several theme lines - editions intended for the general public, children's literature included, contemporary authors, literary classics, education and art books. The publishing group has a subsidiary company - Random House Mondadori. In 2008 alone, the company's output amounted to 2695 new titles and 5 225 second and third editions, with revenues totaling 434,3 million Euros, which represents a solid 28,8 percent of the overall published production in Italy. In this respect, Mondadori Group outstrips its traditional competitors RCS Group, GEMS Group, Feltrinelli, etc. The structure of Mondadori Group incorporates also: Harlequin Mondadori (a joint venture with the Canadian Harlequin Enterprises from 1981) - specialized in publishing fiction for women; the Electaholding - specialized in publishing history of art books and illustrated editions; the publishing houses Edizioni Mondadori, Edizioni Piemme and Giulio Einaudi Editore. Mondadori Education (Edizioni Mondadori) (since 2008) is a company with offices in Milan, Bologna and Florence, which covers all spheres of Italian education - from elementary to higher education, publishing specialized periodicals alongside the educational materials. Art Mondadori is another structure within Mondadori Group, specializing in art books intended for non-specialists, and offered in attractive graphic designs and layouts. Mondadori Digital is apublishing structure within Mondadori Group since 2008. It unites the activity of digital media in Italy and France in 26 web sites, offering the electronic equivalents of Donna Moderna, the Cosmopolitan, TV Sorri-si e canzone, Grazia, and the French Auto Plus, Auto Journal, Closer, Top Sante, FHM, etc. More recently, license agreements have allowed the publication of periodicals such as Flair Mondadori (with a version in Austria), the Thai interior design magazine (a version of the popular Casaviva magazine, which is also issued in Bulgaria, India, Greece and Serbia), the Interni magazine for interior design and architecture (with a Russian version).

Since 1980 the Mondadori Group has incorporated a publishing house with a long history and traditions in Milan publishing - Sperlig & Kupfer, which was first founded in 1899. Nowadays its repertoire includes titles in the sphere of science fiction and popular science, translated world-famous authors such as Danielle Steel, Mary Higgins Clark, Stephen King, and contemporary Italian authors. There are two divisions in this publishing house: Francinelli - a publisher with a wide literary profile, founded in 1931, and Mondadori Informatica - publishing books aimed at professionals in IT technologies.

The distribution and advertisement of the published production and the printed and electronic media of the publishing group is in the hands of an independent

structure - Mondadori Publicista. Towards the end of 2010 the total published output amounted to 54,4 million copies, 2379 of which are new titles, with the revenue totalling 413,9 million Euros. In 2010 the Mondadori Group occupied a little over 34 percent of the magazine market and 27 percent of the book market in Italy. The group's catalogue for the Frankfurt Fair included 800 titles of printed editions and another 400 digital ones. In the summer of that year an electronic library and an on-line book-store with titles in both English and Italian were launched. A contract was signed with the international structure Amazon for distribution and sale of their production. The modern distribution of book production assumes diverse forms such as book mail and book clubs (women's literature, men's literature, children's literature, music books, religious books, books aimed at the general public). But along with these, there are also retail sales and direct marketing accomplished with the support of Cemit Interactive Media.

The Mondadori Group invests also in Eastern Europe: it has shares in Atika Media Bulgaria Ltd - the company issues the Bulgarian equivalent of Grazia magazine and Maxim magazine, and is a licensee of Playboy magazine for our country.

Bulgarians have also worked for Mondadori Group through the years. The artist Ivan Gongalov worked in the Milan office in the early 1970's and was even promoted to the position of art director. He took part in international book exhibitions presenting the Italian book illustration. OnesuchexhibitionwasheldinBratislavain 1971. Zornitsa Krach-marova is an editor of the Mondadori's economic magazine Economi. She is also author of journalistic investigations with repercussions across the whole of Italy.

The activity of Mondadori Publishing Group was not free from scandals, which resounded in the Italian press. After twenty years of court trials at all levels of the judicial institution, the Fininvest holding,controlled by Silvio Berlusconi's family and managed by Silvio Berlusconi's eldest daughter Marina Berlusconi, which had the control package of Mondadori, was sentenced, in the middle of 2011, by the Milan Appellate Court, to pay a solid sum (about 560 million euro) in damages to its media rival CIR, controlled by Carlo De Benedetti. Most recently, the media corporation Mediaset, thought to be one of the most powerful corporations in printing business on the Apennines, issues some of the most popular printed media in Italy: the Grazia magazine, the Il Giornale newspaper, and the weekly Panorama. Of course, we cannot overlook La Republica newspaper, which was founded at the time of Giorgio Mondadori, and has earned a rightful place in Italian printed media. It needs to be mentioned that the Grazia magazine earned its world renown under the management of Carla Vanni, who managed to find the perfect correspondence between graphic design and adequate thematic content, with attractive illustrations and «live» photographs, effective color pictures, catchy headlines, good backgrounds and illustrative materials. The Grazia magazine is published not only in Italy, but in many other countries around the world: the United Kingdom, France, the Netherlands, Greece, Bulgaria, Serbia, Croatia, Australia, India, China, Thailand, and the United Arab Emirates.

A good example of gradual development, expansion and diversification is the multilateral and enduring business of the Dutch publishing house Egmont. The foundations were laid in 1878 in the working class neighborhood of Copenhagen. Today it is powerful and successful Scandinavian company which has spread its business on the territory of 32 countries - Denmark, the United Kingdom, Russia, Ukraine, China, Bulgaria, Croatia, the Check Republic, Estonia, Finland, Germany, Hungary, Latvia, Norway, Poland, Romania, Sweden, Turkey, among the others. The headquarters is now located in Vogn-magergade.

Egmont Harald Petersen is the founder of the company. He started the business with a small uni-color printing machine, which, with efficient and high-quality work, returned the initial investment in just one year. With the support of his mother Petrin, he showed exceptional talent in illustrated printing. He took publishing risks, supplied new equipment, hired staff and gained popularity in Denmark with the good quality of his editions. He followed closely all innovations in the world of printing and applied them in his company. In 1892 he was the first in Denmark to print a colored image. In 1895 twenty-five people were employed in Egmont Peterson's company. In the mid 1890's an important client of the company was the lady's magazine Damernes Blad. At the turn of the new century, Egmont Petersen credited the magazine, made it over into a family magazine and changed its name to Home (Himiet). The print run has boomed from 2000 copies at that time to 24 000 copies nowadays. In 1914 Egmont was awarded the title of «Printer of the Danish royal court» for his exquisite work in graphic techniques and his achievements in the sphere of printing. Unfortunately, on the 5th of August that same year he passed away. The name of the company was changed to Gutenbergus. From a printing house, the business gradually turned into a leading publishing structure under the management of Jens Christian Petersen. The company started a publishing business, started dealing in paper, and set up an advertising agency. The headquarters were moved to downtown Copenhagen, and the number of customers boomed. The number of employees also rose to a thousand people, and the number of printing presses - to two hundred.

After Jens' death, the management was taken over by Axel Egmont Petersen -Egmont's eldest son. Four years later the singer and song-writer Dan Folk, who worked in the US, joined the management board, and secured a license for the company from the American magazine Reader's Digest. The Norwegian and Danish version of the magazine gained popularity and boosted the image of the company. Folk was also the driving force behind the magazine Alt for Damerne (All for Ladies) since 1946. Two years later Folk purchased from Walt and Roy Disney the copyright to publish the Donald Duckcomics in Scandinavia, targeted at children and juvenile readers. The copyrights for other Disney characters were also purchased. Authors were invited to create original new stories. The Gutenbergus Publishing Service subsidiary wasestablished. In the late 1950's, the Donald Duck magazine reached a print run of 140 000 copies for Denmark alone,

from a monthly edition it became a weekly, and was circulated in other European countries such as the Netherlands and Germany. The Asterix comic series also gained popularity. In the early 1960's, the Aschehoug printing facility was bought, which allowed faster publication of books. Publishing subsidiaries were set up - originally in Germany and later, in the 1970's - in the United Kingdom.

The global trend for corporate restructuring and forming larger and more powerful publishing structures affected the Gutenbergus too. In the mid 1980's the company acquired new structures - the Norwegian publishing house Damm (1984); the Munich-based Danish publisher Franz Schneider Verlag (1985); even the Forlaget Litascompany was bought, which specialized in children's toys and children's literature. The final step in the consolidation of the company was the acquisition of Lademan Group (1988), which had control over Comma Press, Holkenfelt and Sesam publishing houses. Duting the first years of the democratic changes in the former socialist countries - the early 1990's, Gutenbergus opened subsidiary companies in Poland, Russia, the Check Republic. In that period the company completed a merger with the long-standing film company Nordisk film, and changed the name to Egmont. In 1991 the publishing house Egmont-Bulgaria was set up, and in the years that followed it established itself as a leader in publishing children's literature. In the United Kingdom, Egmont bought the children's division of Read Publishing (1998). In Denmark, at the turn of the new century, Egmont acquired the Dutch publisher Bonnier (2007), and its subsidiaries Aschehoug and Lademan were merged into one joint subsidiaryunder the name of Aschehoug (2003). The company also established itself in the distribution of electronic entertainment and products such as the Play Station game and its equivalent Play Station Portable in the Scandinavian region. Nowadays, Egmont creates and publishes a considerable number of diverse comic books, textbooks, pre-school teaching materials and magazines, in cooperation with the world leaders in copyright ownership. Among the popular brands that were established over the years we can mention Winnie the Pooh and Bratz. The company owns five publishing houses in Scandinavia, has firm positions on the children's books market in Europe, enjoys a good reception in Asia, and ranks second in the sale of children's books in the UK. It publishes books in about twenty countries, and is one of Europe's top publishers in the sphere of children's books. It is a leader in all publishing spheres in Scandinavia, with firm positions in film advertisements and film copyright business. Through Nordisk film, Egmont has a part in producing feature films, advertisements and TV shows. Egmont is in television and printed media business. The development of this major Scandinavian company epitomizes the trend for growth and expansion of the publishing industry in Europe, its consolidation and diversification into all spheres of publishing and media business.

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The contribution of the different publishing associations in the development and growth of modern printed media is not to be overlooked. For example, the General Assembly of European Book Publishers is a very active organization. The International Publishers Association (IPA) is an international industry federation representing all aspects of book and journal publishing. Founded in 1896, itrepresents the world's national publishers associations in all international forums, most importantly before WIPO, WTO, UNESCO, etc. In the words of the Secretary General of the International Publishers Association, Mr. Jens Bammel, speaking for the Bulgarian magazine Izdatel (Publisher -Bulgaria), «Associations can assist in developing standards. Open standards such as the reformed ISBN, the digital objects identifier, ONIX, EPUB etc. create a level playing field and create the conditions for open competition and a diverse internet infrastructure»1. He also said in the same interview that today, more than ever, copyright protection is the most important legal instrument through which IPA can assist the work of authors and publishers on a global scale2.

Among the American professional associations, we can single out the American Booksellers Association, the National Association of College Stores, the American Library Association, the Children's Book Council at the International Author's Club (PEN), the International Association of Scientific, Technical and Medical Publishers, the SocietyforScholarly Publishing,and the American Medical Publishers Association. From among the most authoritative related organizations contributing to the success and prosperity of the publishing business, we should give credit to the Association of American Publishers, a structure which encompasses upwards of 300 organizations, with the publishing units known as university presses included. This huge association is involved in a number of activities related to promotion of reading and monitoring the freedom of speech and press; it provides updated information to its members on book sales and book trade, announces government decisions bearing upon the publishing business, as well as practical programs for successful management of publishing companies; it promotes the communication with related organizations and associations. There are a number of committees working within the structure of this association: the Freedom to Read Committee, the Copyright Committee, the World Press Freedom Committee, the Postal Committee - a body regulating and coordinating the activities related to postal expenses, and also committees on legal, insurance and statistical matters. Under the Association of American Publishers, there is a Department for publishing professional literature and scientific works, which clarifies the specific aspects of the publishing process in each thematic line. The International Department of the association contributes to boosting sales through organizing seminars, courses, participation in international book fairs, involvement in publishing projects and purchasing copyrights for editions in English.

In the United Kingdom, Publishers Association UK has a solid impact on the printed communications of the country. The number of its members amounts to 4410 publishers,

who are responsible for 80 percent of the turnover in book publishing business. The UK publishers with the greatest contribution in this aspect are: Blackwell Publishing, Simon and Schuster, Penguin, Macmillan, Taylor and Francis Group, Oxford University Press, Cambridge University Press, Edinburgh University Press, Orion, Hodder and Headline, Random House Group, Elzevir Ltd., Walkers Books, Faber & Faber, Facet Publishing, etc.

In Bulgaria, a big contributor to printed communications is the Association of Bulgarian Book Publishers, which was founded in 1994. Today it is known as Bulgarian Book Association. It is a union of a large number of publishing houses which are actively present on the Bulgarian market. It is actively involved in the organization of many national and international book fairs, Christmas book fairs and scientific forums both in the country and abroad. It is also responsible for organizing and supporting its members in participating in the big Frankfurt Book Fair with their own exhibition stands. The Association works in the sphere of legal initiatives related to intellectual property protection, and is a vocal advocate for publishing business in the cultural policy of the country. Most recently, the Association has created an Ethical Charter of the Bulgarian Book Publishers, Book Dealers, Literary Agents, Libraries and Translators.

No doubt, one of the greatest challenges of the modern world is the struggle between printed and electronic media to win the attention of the general public. In this long-lasting and severe battle, the global network proved to be a decisive factor. The bookstore outlets are becoming more effective in selling books online. The book is increasingly perceived as a form of printed media which becomes more attractive, more communicative, more marketable and more profitable when offered on the internet. Periodicals, when offered online, are perceived on a par with their original and traditional printed versions, and are seen as complementing each other.

The dynamic development of printed communications has posed a challenge in terms of innovations in the publishing and printing production processes. We all remember that in the late 1980's and early 1990's the former socialist countries members of the former Council for Mutual Economic Assistance started undergoing a process of sweeping democratic changes. The changes in the relations within society, the radical replacement of totalitarian ideas with democratic ones went in parallel with the replacement of printing equipment and the introduction of the first innovations in the printing and publishing houses, after years of firmly set and dogmatized approach revolving around the traditional, the established and the «usual» practices and processes. Many production units equipped with linotype and monotype printing presses were closed. The practice of using the poisonous lead-and-tin formulation in linotype and monotype setting was ended. The line-casting and single character casting technologies used in high print were replaced by computer typesetting and modern publishing software. The form-setting department stopped functioning, the photozincography method, which presented an occupational hazard, was phased out. The new production units of the printing facilities started using the first originals of books, newspapers,

magazines, advertising materials and stationery printed on laser printers upon rice paper or foil. Hardly any publisher would have guessed at the time that sustained growth would be impossible without new investments - into well-equipped computer halls for publishing and editing activities both for books and periodicals, into desktop publishing software which was steadily and inexorably taking over, into new studios for modern graphic design.

What publisher of large print-run periodicals could have suspected that it would take very fast orientation and adequate investment into innovations of modern printed communications in order to stay in the printing business? That the urge would be to supply new production lines, to replace the existing printing methods with fast and effective new production technologies that meet the demands of the ever more diverse types of printed materials. To take an innovative approach in monitoring the quality of the product and to provide a constant flow of feedback all along the production line. Thus both publishers and printers were faced with a new challenge in the middle of the 1990's - the need for quick, adequate and timely investments in expanding the production of both books and periodicals. The first steps in Bulgaria were to replace all high print technology, even its culminating version - the stereotypy, with the conventional offset printing technology, and later by the waterless offset, in combination with the options provided by the computerization of printing. It gradually became clear that this was not enough. What it took was also efficiency, cutting down production time and production costs - a feature provided by Computer-to-Plate technology, in which a computer system, in conjunction with an exposure device, transforms the image of the text and illustrations in the offset aluminum plate. Thus, at the turn of the second millennium, a new challenge loomed before printing specialists - the ever increasing need to digitalize the processes in the sphere of printed communications. Initially, digital print looked like an expensive asset, but it soon became clear that, in the case of small and medium print runs, it is both convenient and practical and considerably shortens the path from the original to the printing press. It is a preferred method for university publishers, advertising and publishing houses, printing houses working both with the conventional and digital printing methods, especially with smaller print runs and high-quality production. The digitalization in the sphere of printed communications has led to the creation of modern configurations - a combination between digital and waterless (dry) offset printing. Some of the biggest producers of printing equipment -Heidelberg, Manroland, Komori - are working in this direction. The DICO-WEB method allows the computer to complete the exposure directly upon the form cylinder, upon which the old information is deleted and new information can be exposed. Of course, digitalization in the world of printed communications goes hand in hand with modern nano technologies used in preparing the form for printing. As for deep print, which is almost completely out of use in our country, it is still being applied in the countries with well developed economies, and is successful thanks to the symbiosis of information and

printing technologies - through the method of electronic engraving upon the form cylinder and the computer-to-cylinder technology, which was only recently introduced.

In the theory of printed communications it is an accepted truth that printing is the technological foundation of the publishing industry and that the innovations in printing have a profound impact upon the work of publishers. The main implication of technical prosperity is the reduction of publishing and printing costs and the corresponding reduction in the price of the end product. Even though printing developed as a separate business through the centuries, it was not until the middle of the 20th century that the printed production of books was defined as a separate industry in terms of large print runs, specific characteristics and diversification of the activities. The newspaper industry is not far from book publishing as regards the common technological processes. Computer innovations during the 1980's, thanks to which journalists could typeset their own articles, rather than submit them to typesetters and linotype press operators, led to serious discontent in the trade unions. They were, however, finally forced to resign to the new developments, and so, in the British capital, for example, the newspaper industry moved out of the proverbial Fleet Street and into new well-equipped premises in the City. The Australian tycoon Rupert Murdoch bought the Times newspaper and settled on the prestigious market of the United Kingdom. The acquisition, however, led to some complications because of Murdoch's decision to move the headquarters of the Times in 1986 to a modern well-equipped facility in Wapping in East London. This move was followed by the other big newspaper publishers. The effect was revolutionary - the newspapers now had more pages, multi-color illustrations, columns, supplements and sections thanks to the advance in information technologies and the innovations in desktop publishing and printing. Thousands of jobs were made redundant, the costs of publishing and printing were markedly reduced and profits skyrocketed.

Even though the 1980's were not very favorable for the newspaper industry in Europe and the world, the second technical revolution had a great impact on publishing both periodicals and books. On the one hand, there was an increase in joint ownership of periodicals and publishing houses, as was the case with Murdoch, on the other - the domination of computer innovations in publishing business forced new approaches and radical changes in the structures and in the communication between authors, publishers, editors and printing units, and thence the change in the overall economic relations within the branch.

There are innovations in the management of the big publishing structures in the sphere of printed media in the US too. A good example of this is the control of the Sulzberger family over the New York Times.

In 1963, Arthur Ochs Sulzberger became publisher of the newspaper and also chairman of the Board and chief executive of the New York Times company. At that time the newspaper had an established name, regular subscribers and numerous unsubscribed readers who bought the newspaper, yet the time was also characterized by financial

volatility. Arthur, however, had the necessary qualities of a good manager and succeeded in leading the publishing company to prosperity. In 1992, Arthur Sulzberger Jr. took over the management of the publishing house from his father, and in 1997 he inherited the chairmanship of the Board. «The Times was now national in scope, distributed from coast to coast, and it had become the heart of a diversified, multibillion-dollar media operation that came to encompass newspapers, magazines, television and radio stations and online ventures. The expansion reflected Mr. Sulzberger's belief that a news organization, above all, had to be profitable if it hoped to maintain a vibrant, independent voice»3. These were the words of Clyde Haberman in his memorial speech, published in the New York Times issue from September 30, 2012, at the death of Arthur Sulzberger.

The newspaper stayed with the typical eight-column format until 1976, but then switched to six columns, following the other big newspapers, which had already adopted the six-column format, in order to make it more convenient both for their readers and their advertisers.

In the early 1960's, the management team made an unsuccessful attempt to create a national edition, which was to be distributed in the West of the country, all the way to the Pacific coast of the US. But in 1976, under the suggestion of the manager of the newspaper, it started publishing in four sections (rather than in two, as it had previously). The newspaper started publishing an independent business section and a section dedicated to news from New York. In the same year, they added four Sunday regional sections aimed at the rich suburban dwellers of the megapolis. Each issue was supplemented by mini magazines focusing on recreation and leisure activities for New Yorkers.

In 1980, Arthur Ochs Sulzberger was personally in charge of the launching of a new nationwide edition. Having learned from his previous failure, he commissioned the printing of a version of the newspaper to regional printing houses and divisions throughout the country, which was in effect a lot cheaper than the distribution of the New-York-printed newspaper to the different states by plane. This time the national edition succeeded and part of the reason for this was the launching of advertising activities. More recently, the circulation of this national edition of the printed newspaper amounts to 779 731 copies4.

Even in the years when the company was financially stable, the control remained in the hands of the Sulzberger family. The publishing family managed to overcome internal struggles, confrontation and envy, which typically ravage most publishing dynasties and have a negative impact on the overall corporate business. In this connection, Clyde Haberman was right to point out: «At Mr. Sulzberger's death, The Times was being run by a fourth generation of his family, a rarity in an age when the management of most American newspapers is determined by distant corporate boards. A family trust, unaffected by his death, guarantees continued control by Adolph Ochs's descendants. It was no coincidence, Mr. Sulzberger believed, that some of the country's finest newspapers

were family-owned. „My conclusion is simple", - he once said with characteristic humor. „Nepotism works"»5.

Let us, however, go back to one very important characteristic of the managerial approach of the Sulzberger family - the incredible flair for introducing innovations in the work of The New York Times. New technologies were constantly implemented, circulation was going up. In 1995, the idea for an online edition was launched; an important innovation in the following year was the web-site, which was to attract large readership in the years that followed. Color photography started to dominate the printed edition after 1997. Special editions for the regions of New England and Washington were launched during this period. In 2005 the publishing house started offering the special subscription service Times Select - which allowed subscribers access to the online edition of the newspaper, but two years later the service was discontinues and all the content - news, editorials, articles and much of its archive - was made available to the general public.

The newspaper invested almost one billion in new printing facilities, however incredible it may seem in the eyes of the skeptics in the world of publishing. It was not long before the innovative approaches in printing technologies started to yield good results.

An important step in the management policy of the Sulzberger family was the launching of the electronic version Times Reader in 2006. This allowed subscribers to download the latest issue of the printed newspaper. Improvement of the conditions for publishing and editing was also a priority - the following year The New York Times headquarters were moved to a new building on Eighth Avenue in Manhattan. Seeking not to fall behind its competitors, the company reconsidered its role in the context of the free-of-charge and freely-available internet content. In 2011, The Times implemented a subscription plan for its digital edition, which restricted access to its content.

Thanks to his ingenuity, Arthur Ochs Sulzberger managed to transform the media. During the 1970's, when the other related publishing structures sought to reduce costs, The New York Times manager expanded the newspaper from two to four sections, adding two new sections for city news and business news, and introduced new columns catering for his customers' interests. Even though the initiative was risky, it was based on the idea that the columns would attract new customers, especially women, as well as advertisers. As Clyde Haberman pointed out in his memorial speech: «Some critics dismissed the feature sections as unworthy of a serious newspaper. But the sections -Sports Monday, Science Times, Living, Home and Weekend - were an instant success, without compromising the paper's hard-news core. They were widely imitated. Over the next two decades, a billion-dollar investment in new printing facilities made still more innovations possible, among them a national edition, special regional editions and the daily use of color photos and graphics»6.

The philosophy of the notable manager Arthur Ochs Sulzberger is definitive and firm, it is a life-long and unwavering position - a news publishing structure ought to be

financially independent and economically powerful enough to withstand its firm and independent positions.

As Clyde Haberman pointed out in the above quoted speech: «Mr. Sulzberger's insistence on independence was shown in his decision in 1971 to publish a secret government history of the Vietnam War known as the „Pentagon Papers". It was a defining moment for him and, in the view of many journalists and historians, his finest. In thousands of pages, this highly classified archive detailed Washington's legacy of deceit and evasion as it stumbled through an unpopular war. When the Pentagon Papers were divulged in a series of articles in June 1971, an embarrassed Nixon administration demanded that the series be stopped immediately, citing national security considerations. The Times refused, on First Amendment grounds, and won its case in the United States Supreme Court in a landmark ruling on press freedom»7.

And indeed, in the memorable 1971, the media group was in the center of a dispute after publishing a series of reports based on the Pentagon Papers - confidential government papers on the US involvement in the Vietnam War, which were secretly leaked to the newspaper by a government employee. The Supreme Court of the United States ruled that the publication was protected by the freedom of speech clause in the First Amendment of the American Constitution. The Pentagon Papers won the media company the Pulitzer award a year later.

Other more recent examples of asserting the freedom of speech and press are the firm stand that The New York Times took in the case of Julian Assange and the Wikileaks site (2010), and later the publications in The New York Times regarding the information leaked by Edward Snowden on operational details of a global surveillance apparatus run by the National Security Agency (2013).

By 2011, the newspaper had won 106 Pulitzerawards, outstripping many top American and World media outlets on this indicator. In separate sections and columns, the newspaper often includes news, articles, reviews, and comments on bestsellers, new books and readers' preferred book series, which in effect keeps the readers' interest in books alive.

Based on data provided by the Editor and Publisher magazine, the on-line equivalent of The New York Times for February 2007 had about 13 million customers and 456 million visits registered per year. It is also a leader in terms of the average time spent in the on-line edition - 37,9 minutes8. This is the most visited media site with an online version of a printed edition, followed by the Washington Post, the USA Today, the Los Angelis Time andthe Wall Street Journal.

Having survived the vicissitudes of time, often finding itself in the center of major information events accompanied by scandalous disclosures and hovering more than once on the verge of prosecution, the management team of the big publishing company, together with its regional subsidiary media outlets, and thanks to the innovations and modern publishing and printing technologies, continues to thrive today and remains a

paragon of stable and advanced management in the world of printed communications

and in the face of severe competition and the challenges of the global market.

***

Catering for the modern aspects of printed communications is still on the European agenda. At the end of April 2008, the so called Printing facility of the future was opened in Dusseldorf on premises provided by Print-Plus Media North Rhine-Westphalia. This is anon-profit association which serves as a kind of a know-how center of innovations, technologies and digital print, providing a wide circle of specialists with information on the latest developments and equipment for their publishing and printing facilities. At the end of October 2008, under the auspices of the Manroland company - a big supplier of technologies and equipment in the sphere of printed communications, the Third Balkan Printing Forum took place in Istanbul. In her speech, Beatrice Cloze9 - the Secretary General of Integraf (European Federation for Print and Digital Communication, with headquarters in Brussels) dwelled on some trends in the development of printing industry - the number of employees on the territory of the European Union is going down due to a drop in profitability; the number of specialists and managers in this branch is also going down, with the US and Japan expected to continue this trend in the near future; bankruptcies and mergers are not untypical in the branch. According to Cloze, efforts should be made to reduce production costs, which will open new opportunities for growth; investments are needed in the sphere of human resources, employee health care and improvement of the working conditions; complex solutions in the sphere of communications and value-added services should be offered to customers (the printing business can influence the process of increasing the quality and value of production by setting aside from their own profit margin for «content and performance»). According to statistical data from Integraf, in 2005, there were 130 000 operational printing facilities in the 27 member states of the European Union, with 870 000 employees and specialists involved, the Republic of Bulgaria still not included in this statistics. In the branch of printed communications, the number of small businesses and «micro» enterprises is important, their business targeted at the domestic market and dependent on advertising, their investment mainly in equipment and very little in research and development. The share of digital printing has been increased considerably - 14 percent, while the share of offset printing has dropped from 91 to 57 percent. The share of the other printing services is also going up. Import from China is also on the increase, the leaders in import being France, the Netherlands and Spain. Books, catalogues, magazines and user manuals for a wide range of products are among the most typical imports. There is a growing need for unification of standards in the branch. Special emphasis is laid upon education and training of young printing specialists. On the 7th and 8th November, 2008, a scientific conference was held in Barcelona on issues related to the opportunities for growth and development of young specialists in the branch. A few years later, after years

of economic crisis and stagnation, Integraf depicted a picture which was not much different from the first one. It even outlined some negative trends. The summarized data in Integraf's annual report, which was released in 2013 and included statistical data from the Bulgarian printing industry as well,shows that there are currently 121 000 printing business and companies in the European Union, with 714 000 people in employment and a total turnover of about 88 billion Euros per year10.

A few words about the printed communications in Russia. The Federal Agency for print and mass communication (Federalnoe agentsvo po pechati i massovyi comu-nikatsii) is a very active factor there. It uses an internet site to provide information to thousands of managers and specialists in the branch about different initiatives, scientific forums, promotions and presentations in the sphere of communications. A national program is implemented with the support of the government, seeking to promote reading. The Russian Book Union has earned a place of authority in the country, implementing important initiatives to promote the book and encourage publishing business and book trading. In the sphere of applied scientific research, there have been held branch conferences, among which we can mention Sredtstva massovyi informatsii, knigoizdanie, poligrafia: itogi 2005 goda i perespectivyi razvitiya (Mass media, book-publishing and printing (2005)); «Knigoizdanie v Rosii. Sostoyanie, tendentsii i persepectiv razvitiya» (Book publishing in Russia. The current state, trends and growth prospects (2009)). FAPMK's leader, M. W. Seslavinski, studied the dynamics of the media industry and his report was released on the agency's web site. According to its statistics, there are 59 184 registered printed mass media outlets and 12 770 registered electronic mass media outlets in the Russian Federation, with the CTC Media singled out as the biggest investor. The printed periodicals that were sold in 2006, for example, amounted to a total value of 67,9 billion Russian Rubles. The most sensational deal of the year was the acquisition of the publishing house Kommersant byA. Usmanov, Director General of Gazprominvest holding. Other companies with strong positions during this period were: «Bazovyi element» (Base Element) - owner of OVA Press and holding a large share of stocks in «Gruppa Expert» (Expert Group); «Proff Media» - owner of the «Afish» publishing house and three TV channels; Berezkin's ESN group, which bought the control package of shares at «Komsomolskaya Pravda» (Komsomol Truth) and also owned other newspapers and magazines; the «Media Press» publishing printing complex, which owned the newspapers «Argumentyi i faktyi» (Arguments and Facts) and «Trud» (Labour) as well as some newly acquired publishing and printing structures; and last but not least - Radionov Publishing house - owner of magazines such as «She», «XXL», «FHM», «TopSante», as well as some electronic media. It is obvious that the Russian market was also characterized by mergers and acquisitions, resulting in consolidation of the media assets and an increase in investment over the last years. According to data provided by Seslavinski, the total circulation of Russian newspapers in 2006 amounted to 1,85 billion copies, about half of which were printed on luxurious glossy paper, and 600 000 copies were

printed in foreign printing facilities. In the period 2003-2006, 18 new printing facilities were opened for the printing of newspapers and magazines; 27 federal and 9 republican publishing-printing complexes were set up for color printing of periodicals. The production of printing presses for newspapers and periodicals was restarted in the Russian city of Rybinsk by the Industrial Venture Company. The Inter-regional Association of Printers is another active organization in the Russian Federation. The process of reforming the state-owned companies continued. But 57 out of 6000 printing companies continued to hold 65 percent of the publication of black-and-white books. In the sphere of printing school textbooks, their share was 80 percent, while in printing newspapers their share was much smaller - 40 percent of the printed periodicals11.

Some of the bigger state-owned publishing structures continued to work successfully, especially in the sphere of scientific and academic publications. We are well acquainted with the books published by the «Piter» publishing house in Saint Petersburg, as well as the «Unity-Dana» and «Kniga» (Book) publishers in Moscow. Specialists are also acquainted with the specialized edition «Poligrafist-Izdatel» (Printer-Publisher). A major contribution to the study of printed communications and technologies is provided by the series «Tehnologii Print Media» (Print Media technologies) issued jointly by the Moskovskii Gosudarstvenyi Universitet Pechati (Moscow State University of Print Arts), the Russian-American Center for Printing Technologies and the Komline company. The series was launched in 2004 in Russian language, and its authors were involved in the activity of major branch associations in North America, such as GATF and NAPL.

The research and production enterprise «Nauka» Publishing house, Moscow, is another impressive example. In practice, this is the biggest publishing printing complex for scientific literature, which has its own printing facilities, publishing house and a chain of company stores. A successor in spirit to the Academic typography from 1727 in Saint Petersburg, this big Moscow-based printing house started business in 1922 in the Soviet capital. In 1945 it was passed over in the hands of the Soviet Academy of Sciences, and in the 1990's turned into the leading publishing and printing structure of the Russian Academy of Sciences with a total output of over 2500 titles per year and a total print run of over four million copies of books and magazines. The desktop publishing and printing process use the best of modern technologies - multi-color and uni-color print, digital print, automated book-binding processes for both paperback and hardbound books, illustrated albums and encyclopedias. There is also a special department for hand-made art book-binding. On December 18-19, 2008, a major scientific forum was organized on the premises of the printing house - the international conference «Knrzhnaya kultura. Opyit proshlogo i Problemyi sovremenosti: K 280-letyu akademicheskogo knigoizdatel-stvo v Rosii» (Book culture. The experience of the past and the problems of the present. Towards the 280th anniversary of academic book publishing in Russia). Nauka publishing house published a voluminous scientific collection of the materials presented at the

conference, among which there were studies of the book of science and of the academic publishing activity in Russia, Ukraine, Bulgaria, Belarus and Germany.

Modern printed communications encompass many diverse activities in the sphere of publishing business, printing techniques, the print of periodicals and books, and the distribution and storage of printed production, and they need the support of the branch organizations, the trade unions and other organizations within the member states of the European Union. In the difficult and dynamic new age, the newly acceded member states need new concepts, new strategies, and new regulation in order to cope with the new challenges and to keep pace with the European trends.

At the start of the new millennium, Bulgarian book publishing is characterized by certain trends which rank it with the other member states of the European Union both in terms of publishing business and in terms of the theoretical and practical aspects in the preparation and production of the Bulgarian book. The model which the Bulgarian book is following provides good grounds for optimism. The breakdown of ideological structures responsible for centralized and planned book publishing is complete now. Book publishing business has been transformed for the most part into stock companies and a number of smaller sole traders. There are serious publishing ventures on the part of public institutions, organizations, universities, academic units.

Modern Bulgarian book publishing is increasingly characterized by marked trends towards profiling and specializing; institutionalization; orientation towards market economy and a sharp decrease in the share of state publishing. State book publishing is in effect limited to academic and institutional literature published on behalf of the Bulgarian Academy of Sciences, some of the larger universities and some research institutes. Bulgarian book publishing is present on the narrow book market with clearer concepts and well defined theme profiles of the publishing repertoires. The most welcome production on the Bulgarian market is the production of school textbooks and aiding materials for the elementary and secondary school levels, followed closely by specialized literature in the sphere of applied activities such as foreign language learning, computer programs and IT materials, economic and law books. Several publishers of translated fiction have carved a niche for themselves on the Bulgarian market. The general preference for English authors continues, followed by Spanish, French, German, Russian and Scandinavian. Only a few big publishers have shown a lasting interest in publishing Bulgarian authors of fiction. In the sphere of school, scientific and specialized literature, however, Bulgarian authors have a solid share, and there are plentiful examples of this in many different fields, mostly in humanitarian sciences - History and its diverse subfields such as Archeology, Thracology, Medieval History, Modern and Contemporary History, along with Book Publishing, Media and Communications Studies, Literature Studies, History of Literature, Linguistics, etc.

New forms of distribution and promotion of books, tested in European and global practice, are being implemented in Bulgaria, in which the traditional forms of station-

ary sale are combined with the opportunities provided by the more advanced information technologies. The practices of building local publishing networks, promoting editions through specially designed web pages and the introduction of electronic book stores have worked their way into Bulgaria too. Along with this, the promotion of the publishing activities is brought to a higher level through diverse forms of journalistic genres (the publicity department of the publishing house is responsible for providing adequate, timely and useful information about the newly published books, becoming a part of a wider marketing campaign for the book). In support of Bulgarian publishing are the national and international book fairs and exhibitions organized in Sofia; the presentations of authors and book series, of editorial and publishing teams, organized for a wider audience of readers in different libraries, museums, schools and universities; the use of the opportunities provided by electronic media to promote the work of publishing houses with diverse profiles of theme content. Book promotion is gradually turning into a very apt and well organized form of public communication. There is a marked trend towards promoting book editions in the printed media - many Bulgarian newspapers dedicate a special section, column or a whole page to promoting new books, theme series and even electronic editions or combined multi-media products. In the form of book reviews, interviews, covers of promotional events, etc. newspapers promote authors, publishers, compilers and editors of different library series.

The scientific journal dedicated to book publishing «Izdatel» (Publisher) and the specialized journal «Poligrafia» (Printing) are issued in support of printed communications and book publishing business in Bulgaria.

Electronic book sale applies the good practices of the most eminent global electronic book-selling chains, such as Amazon. com, Blackwell, Barnes & Nobell, Bertelsmann and its subsidiary Media Ways - the secondbiggest internet provider in Germany, which also has a media electronic book store for books and music in Germany and some other countries, such as France, the Netherlands, Switzerland, Spain and the UK. In April 1997, the European Commission passed a strategic document - a «European initiative on electronic commerce», and in October 1999, a system for using credit cards for online payment was introduced for the first time in Bulgaria, and services were offered via the internet. Bulgarian book publishers and book traders did not waste time in developing their own web sites as well as specialized web pages such as books. bg. Among the first Bulgarian publishers to start electronic book sale were: «Kralitsa Mab» publishing house; «Trud» publishing house - a subsidiary of «Media Holding» and part of the big German newspaper concern Westdeutsche Allgemeine Zeitung (WAZ); the publisher of computer literature Soft Press; the electronic book store Pingvinite; the electronic book store Mobilis; the electronic addition to the book retail chain Helikon; the electronic book store Bulgarski Knizhitsi, etc. Online shopping is both quick and convenient. E-book stores are picking up speed in Bulgaria. They facilitate the presentation of the Bulgarian book in the European and global cultural space with minimum expenses and maxi-

mum convenience for the customer, covering a huge territory of both the European and global virtual book markets. Today in Bulgaria electronic equivalents are popular editions of the New Bulgarian Media Group (Monitor, Telegraph, Meridian Match, Politics, Wrestling[Borba], Europost), and other Bulgarian media (as Labor [Trud] 24 hours [24 chasa]), which develop parallel publishing in publishing series for children and adults, have special sections for promoting Bulgarian and translated books.

In recent years, the book in Bulgaria, in effect, has the power of a real media outlet, along with the printed and electronic media outlets - with its messages for the targeted groups of readers, with the ideas and problems it puts forward, with the applicability of knowledge in a world where the gap between theory and practice is closing. This explains the big role of books dealing with geography and history, dictionaries and reference books, computer and software literature - editions which bring us closer to the other European nations. A significant group of Bulgarian publishers rely on translated books of fiction by classical authors, but also criminal series, thrillers, bibliography books about prominent figures in the world of science, arts, business and sports. We only need to mention the series of thriller novels published by the Bard publishing house, and the theme-focused research series Zagadki (Mysteries) published by Hermes. Today, the books published by Bulgarian publishing houses have excellent artistic design, and the color illustrations in the attachments substantiate the author's ideas, impart style to the editions and make them attractive to the reader. The Kibea publishing house has left a mark with its album editions, the beautifully illustrated encyclopedias and the pop-up books. The educationally focused books published by Anibus publishing house stand out with their European style and interesting design decisions. Gaberoff is the publisher of the biggest Modern Bulgarian Encyclopedia. Scientific and educational editions dealing with interesting subjects, showing style and remarkable design have been produced by the Academic publishing house Marin Drinov, the St Clement of Ohrid University Press, the St Cyril and St Methodius University Press, Slovo,Lik, Siela, Abagar, Slantse, the Military Publishing house, Faber, Anibus, Sibi, Hermes, the Tangra Foundation, etc. The publishing houses which need to be mentioned when it comes to publishing fiction by Bulgarian authors are: Zahari Stoyanov, Faber, Janet 45, Slovo, Anibus, Abagar, etc.

Bulgarian books which are offered in luxury binding are, for the most part, distinguished by their high quality and original design. Another positive development is the fact that most of the publishers who have been longer in the business, have acquired the practice of adding the bar code of the book on the back cover, which makes it easier and more convenient for book sellers to operate, especially in retail book stores. There is also a tendency for an increase in the price of the books, especially those which are part of library series. This is partly due to the steady increase in the price of printing, which includes additional services to improve the design and quality of the book - e. g. the increase in the number of color illustrations not only on the book cover but also in

the text block, the use of laminated and varnished book covers, luxury book jackets and multi-color attachments.

An excellent example of the steady growth of book publishing in Bulgaria is to be found in the sphere of children's editions. The use of different formats, high quality cardboard, colored and specially processed paper and cardboard, as well as digital printing technology increases the cost of the published production, but it also improves competitiveness especially in the conditions of global book trade. The Bulgarian printing industry, which is, in recent years, competitive to the European printing industry in terms of possibilities and quality, is also to be credited for the better quality of the book. An increasingly greater number of printing facilities are supplied with high-tech equipment and modern technologies in book production. There are printing houses in Bulgaria which have foreign customers. Still, however, the cost of printing services is too high, not to say impossible, for most Bulgarian publishers, and they are often forced to settle for less expensive offers, which is quite often at the expense of poorer exposure quality, low-quality print and / or compromises with the type of paper.

Thanks to the private publishing initiative, in the mid 1990's, there was an increase in the number of published titles. At the end of 2008, the number of Bulgarian publishing houses reached the impressive figure of 3651, located in 115 towns - the capital holding the biggest share, followed by the other major cities: Plovdiv, Varna, Stara Za-gora, Burgas, Veliko Tarnovo, Shumen, Ruse, Dobrich and Blagoevgrad. By the number of published books and brochures, however, the capital is followed by Plovdiv, Veliko Tarnovo and Varna. In that same year, the number of published magazine titles was also on the rise. The titles of books and brochures were predominantly in the sphere of fiction, scientific literature and educational literature. In the ongoing editions, the biggest share was that of books dealing with society and politics.

The institutions related to book publishing in the European countries have century-old traditions. Book publishing is promoted and stimulated in a number of ways - with providing tax preferences, supporting authors in the respective country, organizing competitions, conferring awards for creative contributions and good publishing, purchasing part of the print run to be granted to libraries. The latter practice secures a minimal number of copies to preserve and guard the national printed heritage, on the one hand, and to stimulate the creative processes, on the other. In the Republic of Bulgaria, unfortunately, the value added tax continues to have a negative impact on the sale of books, making them too expensive and unaffordable for a great number of Bulgarian readers. Publishers are seeking different ways to subsidize the book publishing process. The publication of translated books in Bulgaria is often supported by projects implemented by the cultural ministry or culture center at the Embassy of the respective European country or the US. Single books or whole series can be published as a joint project between Bulgarian publishing houses and foreign cultural institutions or foundations - from the US, France, the UK, Germany, Italy, Austria, the countries from Benelux,

Portugal, Russia, etc. The books that fall into this category are usually in the sphere of scientific research, history of literature, fiction and poetry. European institutions seek to find ways to support and stimulate Bulgarian translators and publishers, which has become a lasting and reliable policy of many European countries. The experience acquired through this publishing policy in the context of intense cultural exchange between the member states of the European Union and with the leading countries of the world in the sphere of book publishing and printed communications, is a necessary prerequisite for the prosperity of the Bulgarian book. This experience is also valuable in the sphere of cultural communication because, in today's reality, it would take an immense effort to work in the opposite direction - to ensure that Bulgarian books are translated, sold on the international book market and find a rightful place in foreign libraries. The thirteen centuries of Bulgarian history, culture, science, art and literature can serve as a bridge towards other cultures, towards mutual understanding and common cultural prosperity.

Примечания

1 Izdatel. 2012. № 3/4. P. 6.

2 Ibid.

3 Clyde H. Publisher, who transformed times dies at 86 // The New York Times. 2012. Sept. 30, № 55910.

4 URL: http: // nytimes. com (дата обращения: 21.04.2016).

5 Clyde H. Op. cit.

6 Ibid.

7 Ibid.

8 URL: http: // nytimes. com (дата обращения: 21.04.2016); Most Popular Newspapers Site -Here is Top 30. URL: http: // editordandpublisher. com (дата обращения: 21.04.2016).

9 Cloze B. Profil na poligraficheskata promishlenost v Evropa. URL: http: prepressbg. com (дата обращения: 21.04.2016).

10 Poligrafia. 2013. № 4. Р. 31.

11 URL: http: // farms. ru (дата обращения: 21.04.2016).