Where readers go, there must be publishing.

Vietnamese people are not reading less but reading more, but they have more ways of reading. More ways of reading means more space for publishing. Publishing must seek different ways of reading to create suitable products.

Innovation will be the main story of publishing. Innovation in how to make books, how to distribute books, in new business models, new cooperation models. Publishers must think broadly, must be bold to try to find what is suitable for each publisher. That is one of many instructions of Minister of Information and Communications Nguyen Manh Hung. at the conference on Deploying Publishing and Publication Distribution 2024, held in Hanoi on March 22, 2024. VietNamNet would like to introduce the full text of the speech by Minister Nguyen Manh Hung.

Minister of Information and Communications Nguyen Manh Hung: Innovation will create the future of publishing and creativity here is limitless. Photo: Chi Hieu

The difficulties of recent years show that the Publishing industry needs to innovate and rethink books. The Publishing industry is in the process of being reborn and will have a new form to make better books. A field that is in difficulty is when it is being replaced by outside organizations that have not found a new direction. When there is a new industrial revolution, there will be businesses using new technology to create alternative products in many industries and fields. The fourth industrial revolution creates digital transformation, creating a new space, cyberspace (KGM). In the Publishing industry, a series of new businesses, mainly digital technology businesses, have naturally appeared, which have never done publishing but have products that replace publishing, mainly in cyberspace. So how will we respond? If something is taken away, taking it back is a natural reaction, but taking it back requires using technology. However, technology in the publishing industry is not as strong as that of technology companies. Using new technology to do a better job in the old space does not require excellent technology but can be done by yourself. In the new space, it requires excellent technology. Therefore, cooperating with technology companies will improve the competitiveness of the publishing sector. Publishing will have to operate simultaneously in both spaces. The old space with the help of new technology will be expanded, improving quality and labor productivity. The new space will help publishing expand the market, create new products, and create long-term development. But these two spaces do not operate independently but complement each other. Wherever and whatever is better online, go online and vice versa. Publishing is both political , cultural, and economic, so if these three factors are combined smoothly, publishing will be successful. Politics has the support of the State. Culture has the support of the people. The economy is supported by the market, so exploit and combine these three factors skillfully. Vietnamese people are not reading less but reading more. But they have more ways to read, including not reading by asking virtual assistants. More ways to read means more space for publishing. The space for creativity is also much wider. Publishing must find different ways of reading to create suitable products.

We must go where the readers are. Therefore, innovation will be the main story of publishing. Innovation in how to make books, how to distribute books, in new business models, new cooperation models. Therefore, we must think broadly, must be bold in trying many things to find what is suitable for each publisher. Innovation will create the future of publishing and creativity here is limitless. The Ministry of Information and Communications will take over and handle Sandboxes in the publishing field. The book will still be a book but in countless forms. Countless forms are the way for books to reach millions of people. A printed book can only reach thousands, tens of thousands, hundreds of thousands of people, but in a concise form and on multiple platforms, the book can reach millions of people and more. Therefore, the value of books also increases. Books can now go much further than before. Building a digital platform for book publishers, providing automated and intelligent tools for book makers from the stages of composition, editing, production, introduction and multi-platform distribution, creating many multi-form versions of books, then collecting readers' feedback, interacting with readers. Readers also participate in the stages of book making, analyzing data to serve each customer individually in a targeted manner, analyzing data to detect market trends... An open digital platform will attract many resources to make books, possibly unlimited. So open your "box". Cooperation, especially cooperation with digital technology companies is the main solution for the Publishing industry.

Printed books have vitality and uniqueness that e-books cannot replace. In the photo: Minister Nguyen Manh Hung and leaders of the Ministry of Information and Communications at the printed book display of the Information and Communications Publishing House. Photo: Chi Hieu

Books must have a means of transmission. If there are new means of transmission in the digital environment, they should be used. Books are the creation of knowledge. Nowadays, there are new ways to create knowledge, new tools for more people to create and spread knowledge. Publishing houses can become a platform providing tools for many people to write, publish, and distribute books. To develop books and develop publishing, there must be readers, many readers, which means there is a market. So let's start promoting reading. We have changed Vietnam Book Day to Vietnam Book and Reading Culture Day. Many countries have reading hours in high schools. Prestigious people, politicians, businessmen, artists, and famous people should read books and participate in introducing books.

Recently, some press agencies have re-established the column "A book a day" on television and in newspapers. The number of books that a Vietnamese person reads each year is not high compared to other countries in the region and the world . Books are knowledge. Knowledge must reach more people for the country to develop quickly and sustainably. Therefore, the Publishing industry has the task of increasing the number of books that a Vietnamese person reads each year. Publishing is also a business, and business must have a brand. A brand is created by differences. We have many publishers, each publisher must have its own brand to avoid confusion with other publishers. If all publishers are the same, then only one publisher is needed. Finding their own unique strengths, publishers will also find a different business model. Business requires introduction and promotion. "Poor" bookstores will have a hard time promoting. Therefore, Vietnamese telecommunications networks can help Vietnamese publishing, help Vietnamese books by sending a free text message to people about books every week. This action may be small, but for books it is too big because to send 4 text messages/month to 100 million Vietnamese people, the cost is 60 billion VND. Regarding some difficulties in publishing, the first is the lack of topics. The lack is because we aim at bestsellers. Bestsellers are in the Western market. Bestsellers are those who sell millions of copies. But in Vietnam, it is not necessarily the case, bestsellers are not necessarily suitable and have never sold 1 million copies. Therefore, we must approach differently, we must know the tastes of Vietnamese readers, that is, we must know the market, we must research the market, and then we must read many manuscripts to find the right one, which sometimes has a very cheap price. Second, the traditional book market is shrinking. If publishers now determine that there are 2 spaces to operate, they will see that the market is not shrinking. We still do the traditional market but it is more diverse, satisfying more special needs, for example, printing books that have been identified as having high value with higher quality and higher prices. Old space but new way of doing things. The new space is the digital space, so it must be considered a new living space even though the revenue is not high yet. These two spaces are not independent but complement each other. For example, cyberspace is used to test the market, then print. Cyberspace is cheap while real space is expensive. Recently, a film company created a digital platform to write and read stories for free, stories that many people read will be made into movies. Therefore, in the digital environment, it is possible to test the market very well. Third, e-books grow slowly. If we consider e-books as an independent market, it will be very difficult to do, we will see a small market, small revenue. The US is a country where e-books are very developed but the market share is only 20%. The solution here is to consider the two markets, the traditional market and the cyber market, as one and complementary. E-revenue may be low but it helps increase printed book revenue or vice versa. We should think “and” rather than “or”. The word “and” is the hardest word to learn. But only the word “and” opens up new spaces for cooperation. Fourth, the human resources in the Publishing industry are limited. The limited human resources are because we do not know how to generate high revenue and pay high salaries, but there is no shortage of human resources. Therefore, the root of human resources is in business, in that books are on the market but publishers still do not think about the market. Publishing is economics , is business. Publishers must think like businesses, starting from the market, continuously innovating technology, managing effectively, targeting both the mass segment and the high-value segment. Regarding some key tasks in the coming time: First, perfecting the institutions, especially the digital institutions, of the Publishing industry. The focus is on amending the Publishing Law. In terms of institutions, there are copyright issues, the issue of operating models of publishers, models for forming large publishing houses, cooperation models, and association models. In 2024, the Publishing Department must organize many seminars, inviting domestic and foreign experts to discuss new publishing models. Second, building digital infrastructure for the publishing industry. The focus is on digital publishing platforms, AI platforms serving publishers. And these are shared platforms, at least at a basic level. Third, training digital human resources for the publishing industry. Digital human resources will be the basic production force of publishing. Training includes training on usage levels and in-depth training through retraining of publishing staff. Training on business and management is equally important as training on digital technology, if anything, more important. The Publishing, Printing and Distribution Department must lead this training. Fourth, do a good job of statistics and data. Without data, it is impossible to make the right policies and manage. Connect online from the Department to publishing units to do a good job of statistics and reporting. Organize social surveys to have a deeper insight into this field. Fifth, every year there must be a few books that hundreds of thousands, millions of people read, creating a common awareness of the whole society about a certain value. The Department of Publishing must also play the role of conductor so that books have balance, balance in the Vietnamese knowledge system.

The mission of publishing is still to create knowledge, to store, accumulate and disseminate knowledge, but the methods need to be innovated. Books are an open and developing concept, if they do not change, they may be replaced. It is time for publishing to innovate strongly to survive and develop, opening a new page for the publishing industry. That is digital publishing. That is the combination of traditional publishing and digital publishing. Think the opposite and do differently. Big and long-term difficulties and challenges are often only solved when thinking differently. In many cases, thinking small will not work, but thinking big can be done because thinking big will change the way of doing things, change the approach. Therefore, it is very possible that the first innovation of the publishing industry is to think bigger....

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