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Roundup: Cyber Trends Bring New Look to HK Book Fair
The rapid advance of e-commerce in the publishing industry has breathed new life into the Hong Kong Book Fair 2000, which opened in Hong Kong Wednesday to give publishing professionals, book collectors and readers alike a rare chance to access new publications and grasp the latest trends in the publishing world.
"Development in information technology and the widespread of the Internet have breathed new life into the publishing industry," said Secretary for the Treasury of the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region Denise Yue while speaking at the opening of the five-day fair.
"Education portals, cyber bookshops and e-publishing are flourishing, offering a platform for the exchange of business ideas," said Yue. The book fair helps boost these new trends in the publishing industry, she said.
To common book collectors and readers alike, the fair, organized by the Hong Kong Trade Development Council (TDC), offered a wide range of books, almost suitable to every hobby or commercial requirements, from finance, fashion to cookery, travel, education, medicine and autobiography.
For the publishing professionals, the fair was not merely a business venture, but also an important vantage point to grasp the latest trends in the publishing world, especial in the emerging e- publication world.
In the light of the cyber trends in the publishing industry, this year's Hong Kong Book Fair broke new ground with the launch of a Cyber World section, which featured the increasing popular e- publications, cyber bookstores, publishers and education portals.
A number of on-line publishers displayed at the Cyber World section their latest publications, drawing many cyber-fans to have a new experience of the e-book store and e-publications world. An equally significant development concerns multi-media. "CD- ROMs and the Web are no longer viewed with mistrust, on the contrary, many publishers maintain that books and information technology will draw ever closer," said Frederick Lam, deputy executive director of the TDC.
Two days' special conferences and CEO forum were scheduled for publishing professionals to explore relations between traditional and on-line publications and the prospect of e-publications.
The theme of the Asian Publishing Conference is "The Second Wave Development of E-commerce and Traditional Publishing, focusing on current trends in traditional publishing and the impact of the Internet.
The CEO forum, entitled "Frontier of E-commerce in Chinese Books Publishing," will include presentations by high-profile senior executives involved in the on-line book store businesses in the Chinese mainland, China's Hong Kong and Taiwan.
Hong Kong is one of the world' largest centers for Chinese language publications, with about 3,000 book titles published each year, placing it behind China's Taiwan with 20,000 new titles yearly and the Chinese mainland with 100,000.
The Hong Kong Book Fair 2000 showcased many new titles as well, a positive sign that the regional publishing industry is recovering, after the Asian financial crisis when the publishing industry was hurt seriously.
Since its inception in 1990, the Hong Kong Book Fair has been established as one of the most important events of its kind in the Asia-Pacific region.
This year's book fair has drawn more than 370 companies from the Chinese mainland, Hong Kong, Egypt, Singapore and the United State, requiring a 30 percent increase in total exhibition area over last year's fair.
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