Manning Publications has Big Data: Principles and best practices of scalable realtime data systems by Nathan Marz and Samuel E. Ritchie out in an EARLY ACCESS EDITION. The book is due out in the summer of 2012.
You can order today, either in paper or ebook formats + “MEAP” (Manning Early Access Program). And, for that you get early access to the content and are invited to provide feedback to the author.
Used to, publishers paid for editors. Now editors are paying for the privilege of commenting. That’s a pretty good trick.
Who among us isn’t vain enough to “need” early access to a new book in our field?
Who among us isn’t vain enough to have a “contribution” to make to a new book in our field?
Vanity has a cost, we pay ahead of time for the MEAP edition and we contribute our expertise to the final work.
I don’t object to this model, in fact I think other publishers, who will go nameless, could benefit from something quite similar.
If you think about it, this is quite similar to the motivational model used by Wikipedia to solicit contributions.
Except they have not stumbled upon the notion of paying to contribute to it. A yearly charge for the privilege of submitting (not necessarily accepted) edits and the ensuing competition as articles in Wikipedia improve would insure its existence for the foreseeable future. If you know anyone in the inner circle at Wikipedia, please feel free to make that suggestion.
I mention the Manning/Vanity model because I think it is one that topic maps, public ones at any rate, should consider. You are always going to need more editors than you can afford to pay for and a topic map of any size, see the example of Wikipedia, is going to need ongoing maintenance and support. Unless you are going to sell subscriptions or otherwise limit access, you need another income model.
Taking a page from the Manning book and starting from the presumption that people are vain enough to pay to contribute and/or see their names with “other” experts, I think a yearly editing/contribution fee might be the way to go. After all, someone with less expertise might say something wrong that needs correction, so there would be an incentive to keep up editing/contributing privileges.
I would not take on established prestige venues where publication counts for promotion, at least not just yet. Think of alternative delivery or subject areas.
Some quick examples:
- Book Reviews to cellphones – Local reviews while you are in the stacks.
- Citizen Crime Reports – The stories w/locations before it hits the local news. A 1-900 number possibility?
- Restaurant Reviews – These are already appearing on cellphones but think of this as more of a filtered Craigslist.
The traditional information venues aren’t going anyway and it is better to take them on from a strong base. Think of NetFlix. Alternative delivery mechanism, convenience that traditional channels were slow to follow. Now, we’ll have to see what NetFlix decides to do with that power.