He spoke about ‘The Future and Potential of Books in the Era of Corona,’ comparing the WIPO-IPA Global Publishing statistics with the latest publishing data from US, German, Spanish and UK sources. He spoke about the boom in children’s books and hard back publishing in some territories, as well the steep rise in sales of audiobooks and ebooks. More worrying was the extreme dip in educational publishers’ income over the past 6 months as they felt the effects of national lockdowns and the closure of schools. He finished with a brief look at Artificial Intelligence and the IPA’s Post-COVID Action Plan.
Other participants included Moderator Jae Ho Kang from Seoul National University, Martina Barth from Frankfurt Buchmesse, and Bradley Metrock from Digital Book World. A lively question and answer session rounded off the panel. You can watch the panel discussion here: