No print literary magazine can beat this one stop shop. So, how can print publications defend themselves?

By being creative and by not conceding defeat is how.

Consider WuliWeb's example of thinking outside printed box.

It is a simple online application which enables its users to "send, save and share material from print publications". Participating magazines and newspapers print "WuliCodes" on their (physical) pages and WuliWeb subscribers barcode-scan, or manually enter them into their online "Content Manager" via keyboard, PDA, pager, cell phone, or fixed phone (using a PIN). The service is free (paid for by magazine publishers and advertisers) and, according to WuliWeb, offers these advantages to its users:

"Once you choose to use WuliWeb's free service, you will no longer have to laboriously "tear and share" print articles or ads that you want to archive or share with colleagues or friends. You will be able to store material sourced from print publications permanently in your own secure, electronic files, and you can share this material instantly with any number of people. Magazine and Newspaper Publishers will now have ability to distribute their online content more widely and to offer a richer experience to their readers. Advertisers will be able to deploy dynamic and media-rich content to attract and convert customers, and will be able to communicate more completely with their customers."

Links to shared material are stored in WuliWeb's central database and users gain access to them by signing up for a (free) WuliWeb account. Thus, user's mailbox is unencumbered by huge downloads. Moreover, WuliWeb allows for a keywords-based search of articles saved.

Perhaps only serious drawback is that WuliWeb provides its users only with LINKS to content stored on publishers' web sites. It is a directory service - not a full text database. This creates dependence. Links may get broken. Whole web sites vanish. Magazines and their publishers go under. All more reason for publishers to adopt this service and make it their own.

Sam Vaknin is the author of Malignant Self Love - Narcissism Revisited and After the Rain - How the West Lost the East. He is a columnist for Central Europe Review, United Press International (UPI) and eBookWeb and the editor of mental health and Central East Europe categories in The Open Directory, Suite101 and searcheurope.com.

Visit Sam's Web site at http://samvak.tripod.com

All you would need is a good clear voice for reading without stammering or hesitation, and with a lively, instead of monotone voice. It wouldn't matter if you sat in a wheelchair, or had no use of arms and legs.

The same reading could be put on tape or CD. Besides audio, CD might have a graphics or flash movie version as well.

If you know, or could learn some web design skills, you could volunteer or make small paying arrangements with various authors to turn their books into e-books. If they have a website they might be happy to pay you a small commission on each downloadable copy sold alongside of their print book.

If they don't have a website - guess what - you have skill, so offer to build that author a simple one or two page website to sell her books. All it needs to be is a terrific sales letter with ordering links at bottom. You'd think writer could write up that effective sales letter, right? You'd just copy and paste it into web page.

Should it happen that you have more advanced skills, or they grow on you, why not set up a library, or bookstore of ebooks? Market it specifically to those who need benefit of being able to read a book on their computer.

Hey-hey, before too long even those with 20-20 vision will come snooping around, praising advantages of digital books. You'll be a trend-setter.

The whole publishing world is like it's just had an earthquake, and after-shocks haven't all hit yet. The dust hasn't settled on all changes coming. Be a Mover and a Shaker.