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Book trade in the United Kingdom has its roots as far back as the 14th century, however the emergence of internet booksellers such as Amazon partnered with the introduction of the e-Book has drastically altered the scope of the industry. Book retailers such as the Borders Group have failed to adjust to these changes, thus there has been a steep decline in the number of operating traditional and independent bookshops. However, still heavily influential on the trade globally, British publishers such as Penguin Books and Pearson remain dominant players within the industry and continue to publish titles gloablly. ] ==History== By the 14th century a commercial book trade had been established in the UK, and before printing was introduced to Europe by Johannes Gutenberg in 1439 the trade consisted of scribes who wrote manuscripts.〔Feather, John, ''A History of British Publishing'', 2nd ed (GB:Routledge Ltd, 2005)P.9〕 By the early 15th century the majority of those engaged in these activities were situated in London and belonged to a trade guild called the Company of Stationers.〔Feather, John, ''A History of British Publishing'', 2nd ed (GB:Routledge Ltd, 2005)p.23〕 By the 16th century publishers and printers controlled the book trade and introduced a commercial aspect, relying for much of their income on the sales of popular religious books, almanacs, prognostications and similar literature.〔Feather, John, ''A History of British Publishing'', 2nd ed (GB:Routledge Ltd, 2005) p.26〕 By the 20th century, as literacy became increasingly universal within society and disposable income increased, publishers were faced with new opportunities. In 1900 the Net Book Agreement was introduced to ‘help to maintain a chain of stock holding bookshops while giving the publishers sufficient confidence to publish new titles’〔Feather, John, ''A History of British Publishing'', 2nd ed (GB:Routledge Ltd, 2005) P150〕 The introduction and demise of the Net Book Agreement heavily impacted the publishing industry. First established in 1900, the Act involved an agreement between booksellers and publishers to fix the price of books in order to “help maintain a chain of stock holding bookshops while giving the publishers sufficient confidence to publish new titles”〔Feather, John, ''A History of British Publishing'', 2nd ed (GB:Routledge Ltd, 2005)p.150〕 抄文引用元・出典: フリー百科事典『 ウィキペディア（Wikipedia）』 ■ウィキペディアで「Book trade in the United Kingdom」の詳細全文を読む スポンサード リンク
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