Literature festival to go social

In an attempt to keep pace with the growing influence of social media on content creation and consumption, the Emirates Airline Literature Festival will hold an interactive session tomorrow night on social media's role in publishing.

Top selling authors Caroline Lawrence, Chris Cleave and author and broadcaster Paul Blezard will join a panel moderated by Dubai-based author and social media advocate Alexander McNabb.

"This free session will see authors and readers coming together to discuss the role of social media in publishing, writing and reading. We're going to have fun, throw out a few challenges and see how publishing is being transformed by the internet," McNabb told Emirates Business.

"This session was the Festival's idea. There are an increasing number of authors communicating with their readership online, from social media stars such as Neil Gaiman through to newly published authors. Blogs, Twitter and Facebook – as well as other online tools – are starting to transform the relationship that authors have with readers," he said.

How social media and the expectations of online audiences are transforming publishing and how these online relationships could become critical for authors and publishers alike, are a few topics that will be tackled.

Asked why he felt this was a discussion point, McNabb, who is also the group account director at Spot On Public Relations, responded: "There is my genuine interest in the topic from a professional point of view for a start, I do, after all, work for an agency that's very wired up with all this social media stuff. But this one's personal, too.

"Publishing houses are trying to find ways to use social media and the internet that compliment their more traditional marketing machines."

The session will be held on Friday, March 12 at 8pm at the Intercontinental Dubai Festival City Conference Centre.

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