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This paper deals with four cultural and historical features of book industry that still determine the nature of book business. The paper concentrates on how these features impact book industries in linguistic communities with a relatively small number of speakers. The paper also examines the reasons for absence of the publishing education and contemporary publishing research in the world of academia. In its final part, the paper shows the reason why, at least for the time being, e-books will not outperform printed books and stresses that current developments have triggered not only new research on contemporary books, but also created a set of threats and opportunities for book business in small language communities. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article includes an overview of the development of e-publishing in Estonia. The treatment is based on the analysis and comparison of existing research, mainly student papers; statistical data from the database of Statistics Estonia and the National Library of Estonia, articles in the periodical press and homepages of various institutions. The beginning of the article presents the description of the publishing industry during the 2000s. In accordance with the development of economy the book production has moved from the peak in the mid-2000s to recession in 2008-2010. The declining market led to the decrease in print runs (since 2008) and book title production (since 2010). The number of publishers, however, increased even during the crisis. The small-language market is of no interest to international companies, so the book industry works on local capital. Estonia is characterised by early adoption and wide use of the Internet. The web publishing by organisations, associations and individuals is widespread since mid 1990s, but commercial publishers remained aside of this trend. As in many other European countries, especially small countries, the publishers were uncertain about the application of copyright in the digital environment and technological skill gaps. These worries were largerly overcome by the establishment of e-publishing service providers in 2010, which led to the take off in the publishing of e-books. The number of e-books produced and the sales have increased a number of times, but their share of the book market is rather marginal. The book buyers and readers still hold to traditional book form. The official cultural policy, however, favours e-books and supports different projects that provide free access to Estonian classical literature and modern authors. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Most European e-book markets are currently being created. Publishers are going through a transitional phase and together with the printed content creators becoming the designers of e-content. The integration of technology into business processes is becoming an important business challenge together with the creation of new publishing products. All this is possible only through mutual work of other sectors in the creative industries. The paper tries to show the possibilities a small publisher has and identify the obstacles to the development of such markets. It discusses the advantages of a traditional publisher compared to new entrants, the skills that a traditional publisher develops and implements. One of the obstacles for the development of a small market is a high VAT rate for e-books throughout Europe. A special emphasis will be put on the Croatian market, which upon the entrance to the European Union had to apply a new tax policy regarding books. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]