In 2010, Google estimated the number of unique books published in the whole of recorded history at
just under 130 million. Josh Koppel, the founder of New York’s ScrollMotion, would love for every one of those volumes to be republished on the new digital platforms made possible by the
iPad and other tablets. And that’s just books — for Koppel there are also magazines, newspapers, websites, journals and even financial reports and baseball cards that could use the tablet treatment.
Koppel’s desire to see the world’s information repackaged on mobile platforms isn’t one borne from greed, but rather for a deep respect for the printed word and a passion for preserving it. The iPad was a game changer in publishing, Koppel once told Mashable, because it was the first electronic reading device that legitimately felt additive, rather than reductive. Koppel’s work shows deference to the established art and culture of print, even while transitioning books and magazines to new digital formats that can enhance the way readers engage with content.
We had the to chance to sit down with Koppel following his presentation at Mashable Connect 2011, to discuss the transition of print media to digital and the future of publishing.
Q&A with Josh Koppel, Founder & CEO of ScrollMotion
Smartphones and tablets have challenged our notions of what printed “content” is and how it behaves. Yet, part of your goal at ScrollMotion is to preserve the culture of print even while pushing new digital boundaries. What’s the secret to finding a balance between adding value by taking advantage of available new tools and adversely affecting the integrity of the content?
“Everything we do must serve the book first.”
We believe that the book is an art form and the essential medium to tell the story of human history. Everything we do must the serve the book first. Just like special effects can’t make a movie, the most important thing we can do is create a reading experience that is at its core, reading. All of the “stuff” — interactions, social media, RSS feeds, etc. — are all there to enhance the reading experience. If the book is overshadowed by the bells and whistles, it defeats the purpose.
One of the most important aspects of the ScrollMotion platform is that it’s not confined to just a single device. The ease in which you are able to repurpose content across multiple channels is due in large part to your decision to use HTML5. What are the advantages to that approach? How does it help you scale?
We see HTML as the only archival format. I can’t tell you what the next great feature of the iPad will be, but I’m pretty sure it will have a web browser. HTML5 allows publishers to put their content into open formats that are less likely to get marginalized. Who would have thought five years ago that proprietary formats like Flash would get pushed out of the workflow? But it has. And since our apps can support thousands of documents across a wide variety of content types, we make it very easy for brands that work with different types of media to produce a single solution across all of media.
During your presentation at Mashable Connect 2011, you mentioned the upcoming release of web-based publisher tools that would allow anyone to develop media-rich, interactive, multi-platform experiences. That strikes me as a potentially game changing development. How do you think such a drastically lowered barrier to entry might shake up the media and publishing industries?
ScrollMotion was founded on the idea that all of the print content in the world is going to be sold one more time. In a lot of cases, the publishers we work with ask for input on how to design a print-oriented interactive experience. But while we offer the tools to transform print to digital, we really feel that publishers need to own the creative process. They need to have a “Chinese menu” of interactions, features and tools, and be able to customize them in the way that they want, to best suit the needs of their customers. Otherwise it’s just moving content from one venue to another, and what we want to do is create a truly interactive and engaged reading experience.
ScrollMotion has been able to consistently innovate in a rapidly transforming media industry. What inspires you? What drives you to keep looking for the next big thing?
The fact that the technology keeps changing and media models are shifting means that we’re constantly being challenged to find new ways to bring content to life. The more new tablets introduced into the market, the more consumers buy, and the more opportunities we have to expand what we do. And, as more businesses and enterprise customers adopt tablets, which they are starting to do, the broader the playing field gets. There’s an incalculable amount of printed material out there that has still yet to be transformed into digital, and that what’s exciting to us.
What are the biggest challenges facing the publishing industry as it transitions to digital? How will ScrollMotion help meet those challenges?
“We see HTML as the only archival format. I can’t tell you what the next great feature of the iPad will be, but I’m pretty sure it will have a web browser.”
Publishers are still figuring out how to transition their print businesses in a way that is both economical and efficient. Beyond just the technological revolution led by the iPad, it has also created a new sense of urgency among publishers to transform their printed pages into pixels.
I think that the more publishers recognize that digital publishing and digital books are here to stay, the more likely they’ll want to engage audiences in new and unique ways. But, they need to realize that digital publishing and digital books can’t just be about migrating printed content to tablets and smartphones. People aren’t going to pay for that. What publishers will have to do is enhance the user experience, which is where we come in.
You’ve been ahead of the curve in your industry for the past decade. As publishers start to explore producing content specifically for digital mediums, what will the media landscape look like? What’s coming next?
ScrollMotion is a company that was founded on the belief that all of the content in the world will be sold one more time on mobile devices. Our job is to help publishers make this transformation. I think you’ll start to see, very soon, more original content that’s evolving from printed content on digital devices – whether it’s self published or through an established player in the media industry.
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