Editor's Note: Fear vs. Opportunity

With print production and distribution costs continually escalating and major flaws in some of publishing’s core business processes, publishers have to continue to seek better ways of doing things—whether by reducing or eliminating returns (check out “The Point of No Returns” feature on page 24); developing better inventory management processes; streamlining trading-partner communication (see Michael Healy’s special “Guest Columnist” column on page 28); or tapping the growing market for digital content.

“At the end of the day, there’s tens of millions of dollars wasted [by] moving paper around,” said Wilcox.

Whether you agree or not, covering your eyes at this point would be a mistake. The e-book market is growing, and it’s worth taking a good, hard look at it to see the opportunity it presents.