If you are reading this blog chances are that you were given a 'head start' in life. If you aren't originally from an english speaking country than you had the 'privelaged' education which enabled you to learn english.
Although english might be the language for business and the language that a vast amount of books/knowledge are written in it or are translated into it. Imagine though that you are Kenyan and your mother tongue is Swahili. To get some of the latest and greatest thinking you first have to learn english and then shell out the money for the book/knowledge. The world is stacked up against you as the chances are you can't affort the $20 on Amazon and also you will be learning in a foreign language.
Books/knowledge can be sold at differential prices. For instance my first book I intend to charge $10-$20 for the english version and the Urdu/Hindi/Other language that is likely to have most of the people not be able to afford it for free or a nominal fee.
Authors and others can 'give back' or donate to the world in this way. Publish their work in english/french/german etc for the normal fee but then 'give back' a translation in a 'likely to be poor economically' language for free. E.g. let publishers or book printers print it for free without copyright. This is how more of the 'bottom of the pyramid' might be able to get out of the bottom. Obviously you can lead a horse to water but you can't make him drink....
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
No comments:
Post a Comment