What if the Game of Thrones Characters were Book Publishers?
by Miral Sattar • April 9, 2015 • Follow miralsattar
Published in Events, News • 5 comments
What better way to celebrate the Game of Thrones Season 5 premiere than to freshen up this post from two years ago.
There’s no question that the publishing industry is going through a lot of changes. It’s the last industry to go digital, and as a result going through the fastest disruption. Watching the Game of Thrones is like watching a war between traditional publishing houses, startups, tech giants, indie publishers, indie proponents, traditional authors, and other players in the industry.
The Game of Thrones, an HBO Series based on the book series by George R.R. Martin, focuses on the mythical kingdom of Westeros. Westeros consists of 9 administrative regions ruled by the Iron Throne. The Kingdom of Westeros is constantly under threat from The Others, White Walkers, and Wildings who live beyond The Wall.
In the beginning of The Game of Thrones the old world order comes to an end. The king of the Iron Throne is killed and the well-loved leader, Ned Stark, is executed. Wars start and pretty soon several houses vy for kingship and their own fiefdoms. In an effort to win, there are struggles, alliances, and marriages between powerful families.
If the Game of Thrones characters were key players in the publishing industry, who would they be? There definitely are parallels between the crumbling kingdom of Westeros and the traditional publishing industry.
Traditional Publishers as King Baratheon
Apple as Daenerys Targaryen
Renley Baratheon as Barnes & Noble
Cersei Lannister as Amazon
Publishing startups as Jon Snow
Stannis Baratheon as Indie Publishing/Self-Publishers
Which side are you on?
Can’t we all just get along? Don’t we all just want good books to read?
About Miral Sattar
Lover of books. CEO & founder of Bibliocrunch. Love storytelling in all its forms. Formerly TIME. I'm a new media entrepreneur who has worked in the media industry for 11 years. My mission is simple – to innovate the publishing industry with technology. My company has been featured in BBC World News, Money Magazine, Bloomberg, Consumer Reports, Forbes, WSJ, MediaBistro, PBS, Columbia Journalism Review, The Next Web, Publishers Weekly, and a bunch of other places. Bibliocrunch was also selected as The Next Big Thing in media by the Paley Center. I also used to run a popular South Asian culture blog called Divanee. Before I ran my own company and became a mom, I used to be on the board for several literacy organizations, and wrote a LOT more. Hopefully, when things are calmer I can go back to that! :)