The publishing value chain has remained relatively consistent since the invention of the printing press. Robert Darnton's influential model of the communications circuit of the book, which tracks how intellectual property circulated in 18 th century France, has been a largely accurate representation of the publishing industry until the late 20 th century. This article examines changes to the publishing industry, particularly as a result of the disruptions and disintermediations of the digital age, and proposes a re-drawing of the communications circuit for the 21 st century.

BackgroundParents with past and current eating disorders (ED) have been shown to report troubles nourishing their infants. This could increase the risk of infant feeding problems linked to maternal anxiety and depression. It is not clear how mothers’ eating difficulties before pregnancy and at the time of birth can affect infant’s feeding. We aimed to specify the impact of eating disorders on mothers’ adaptation and sensitivity to their offspring during feeding, by comparing a population of mothers with eating disorders and controls.MethodsTwenty-eight women agreed to participate in interviews and filmed mother-baby interactions. Pregnant women consulting at an obstetric unit for care follow-up were screened and tested for symptoms of eating disorders with the EDE-Q Questionnaire (Eating Disorders Examination Questionnaire) and the EDE Interview (Eating Disorders Examination Interview). Infant functional troubles and mothers’ sensitivity were investigated through the Symptom Check List. Reciprocal adaptation during feeding with their new-borns was filmed and analysed with the Chatoor Infant Feeding Scale. Before pregnancy, two women suffered from anorexia, three suffered from bulimia, three had binge eating symptoms and two were diagnosed with EDNOS (Eating Disorders Not Otherwise Specified).ResultsMothers suffering from ED tended to show more difficult interactive patterns in terms of dyadic reciprocity when feeding their babies compared with mothers with no symptoms of eating disorders. In the interviews, other than the behavioural data gathered, ED mothers expressed feeling more dissatisfaction and uneasiness during feeding.ConclusionsPregnancy seems to be an useful period for interviewing women on eating disorders, allowing for the design and implementation of prevention programmes based on mothers’ narratives and infant/mother observations and treatment.

Trade publishing has been transformed by the interventions of digital technologies in workflow, products, sales, marketing and distribution, placing the twenty-first century industry in a post-digital age. Editorial commissioning, however, remains a largely traditional process, in which the individual editor’s taste, judgement, and gut instinct combines with company behaviour and market environment in selection processes. Drawing on analyses of publishing’s gatekeeping processes, and a dataset of interviews with UK commissioning editors, the article argues that while, for the main, editorial selection does not currently incorporate big data and algorithmic processes, its reasons for so doing might reside in the need to retain the human within publishing processes, and an evasion of the ‘machine imitating human’