Great Regulars: It used to be that a book was published,

and that was it. Permanent, physical, tangible, it could be referred to for as long as the copy survived. That's not the case any more. We live in a world where page numbers--if they exist at all--don't correlate from device to device, where digital text can be updated at the touch of a button, where the ebooks we own can vanish without our say-so. It's something which is becoming a real issue, particularly for academics.

from Alison Flood: The Guardian: Ebook anxieties increase as publishing revolution rolls on

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As the merger of publishing giants Penguin and Random House rumbles on, the latest phase of publishing's gradual consolidation into larger and larger companies, one of the UK's most successful children's editors, the man who brought readers His Dark Materials, The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time and The Boy in the Striped Pyjamas, is heading in the opposite direction.

David Fickling announced today that he would be leaving Random House, where he has headed up his own imprint since 2001, to set up an independent publishing company, David Fickling Books.

from Alison Flood: The Guardian: Editor of Philip Pullman and Mark Haddon bestsellers leaves Random House

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A.A. Milne famously denounced war in his pacifist essay Peace with Honour, but classified documents found in an old trunk reveal the author of Winnie the Pooh was recruited by a secret propaganda unit during the first world war.

Jeremy Arter was sorting through old paperwork in his aunt's home when he stumbled across rare, classified documents from MI7b, a military propaganda outfit that worked with writers to present a positive version of the war to those at home.

from Alison Flood: The Guardian: Winnie the Pooh author A.A. Milne was first world war propagandist

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