ABSTRACT
Digitization is a truly global phenomenon, incorporating developments in the social, commercial and technological spheres. In technical terms, digitization is the process of converting analogue information: letters, print, photographs, maps, audio, film, video, ephemera and three-dimensional objects into digital form for access, transmission and archiving electronically. Additionally, digitization has been described as the transformation of any signal, whatever its form or nature, into a set of digits for processing and transmission, or alternatively as the integration and interoperability of digital sequences and digital information-processing devices. The digital publishing production and supply chain incorporates authors, publishers, aggregators, technology providers, databases, web distributors and end-users. Commercially and economically, digitization has made possible the structural coupling between the internet and the World Wide Web, and the convergence of formats, functions and industries that has powered the emergence of the global networked or knowledge-based economy.
