Publishing

With digitalization, the possibilties of text publication have increased explosively. But now the literature business is looking for concretely viable approaches. Elisabeth Ruge, Igor Schwarzmann, and Johannes Kleske present three platforms that are not just waiting for answers, but rather take their orientation from the behavior of readers and writers alike.

Examples from the digital literary practice
Practice talk with Elisabeth Ruge (publisher/literary agent, Berlin), Johannes Kleske & Igor Schwarzmann (Third Wave, digital consultancy, Berlin)

Johannes Kleske, Third Wave, Berlin, Business consultancy for the digital world, is a trend scout and strategic advisor. He speaks regularly on the future of work and trends for the management of tomorrow, recently at Re:publica and X.Days in Switzerland. Since 2010, he has been director of Third Wave, a Berlin company for research on the future and consulting which has specialized on observing new developments in digital technologies and their impacts on human behavior. They consult clients such as Deutsche Telekom, MTV, and Deutsche Postbank on how better to understand these developments and to adapt accordingly.

Elisabeth Ruge, publisher/ literary agent, Berlin, was co-founder of Berlin Verlag in 1994, and became its sole managaing director in 2005. She was also the founder of the imprint Berlin AcademicVerlag, which works with open access principles and uses creative commons licensing. Beginning in 2011, she helped to establish Hanser Berlin, and at the start of the year founded the Elisabeth-Ruge-Agentur. She is currently writing her first book, Drei Frauen.

Igor Schwarzmann, Third Wave, Berlin, Business consultancy for the digital world, consults startups, mid-sized companies, and large corporations on communication and product strategy in the digital context. As a sharp observer of the technology industry, he provides expertise on issues in various media and formats, such as networked cities and mobile payment. He was a speaker at SXSW in Austin, Texas and Picnic in Amsterdam, and helped to organize the Cognitive Cities Conference in Berlin. He runs the corporate consultancy Third Wave with Johannes Kleske.