TEXT E Most publishing is now
"electronic" in the sense that books, magazines, and newspapers are prepared on
computers, and exist as computer files before they are printed on paper. Often
there are advantages to giving readers access to the electronic versions of
publications as well as--or even instead of--the printed versions.
Print publications have lots of advantages. Paper is pleasant to handle,
ready to read, and very portable: you can read it almost anywhere. On the other
hand, print has its weaknesses. Paper is expensive, and articles are often cut
to fit the space available. Printing and distributing paper is expensive and
takes time. Printed materials are expensive to store and almost impossible to
search. Electronic publishing offers solutions to all these problems.
Suppose a publisher makes the electronic copy of a newspaper or magazine
available from the net, perhaps on the Internet’ s World Wide Web. No paper is
used and disc space is cheap, so Internet publishing costs very little. Articles
don’ t have to be cut. Internet publishing is fast, and readers can access
material as soon as it becomes available: within minutes, instead of the next
day, next week or next month. Internet publishing goes beyond geographical
boundaries: the humblest local paper can be read everywhere from New York to
London to Delhi to Tokyo. Delivery costs are low because there are no newsagents
to pay, and no postal charges: readers pick up the bills for their on-line
sessions. Also, computer-based publications are simple to store and every word
can be searched electronically. At the moment, newspapers and
magazines, TV and radio stations, news agencies and book publishers are making
content freely available on the Web because they are competing for "mindshare".
Perhaps they want to find out if they can attract and hold an audience on line,
or perhaps they’ re afraid of missing out because "everyone else is doing it".
But don’ t count on things staying that way. Publishers are not in business to
lose money. What does the author probably foresee
A．Readers will have more accesses. B．Books and newspapers will be kept as computer files. C．It will not make any sense to keep the printed versions. D．Electronic publications will replace printed ones.