# A 178 year old company is embracing NFTs to sell books.

**Published by:** [Durwin](https://paragraph.com/@durwin/)
**Published on:** 2022-12-15
**URL:** https://paragraph.com/@durwin/a-178-year-old-company-is-embracing-nfts-to-sell-books

## Content

Pearson is trying to sell eBooks as NFTs but will it work?You read that right. I learnt a few things today and I think you will too. You know Pearson, the name that keeps appearing on all your books, is a publisher from United Kingdom. They have been around since 1844. That’s 178 years ago! For some context, the La Sagrada Familia, one of the oldest and most famous church in Spain, was built in 1882, nearly 40 years after. Pearson used to just print and publish textbooks for audiences all over the world. Now, they make nearly half of their revenue from digital sales. They made $4.71 billion in 2021 and have 32,000 employees. Not exactly a tiny player. Staying in the game, being relevant and still reaping profits after centuries is no mean feat. Guess what this elder statesman decides to do for their next magic trick? Sell its textbooks as NFTs.Selling digital books as NFTs might be a really viable use case for the industry.“After the release of Pearson’s interim results, CEO Andy Bird explained his plan to sell digital textbooks as NFTs, allowing the publisher to track the ownership of a book even when it changes hands, Bloomberg reported.” “In the analogue world, a Pearson textbook was resold up to seven times, and we would only participate in the first sale,” he said, explaining that “technology like blockchain and NFTs allows us to participate in every sale of that particular item as it goes through its life”. It sounds like a simple idea. Most ideas that go on to make a dent in the world usually sounds simple at first glance. Pearson is the largest book publisher in the world. It has “10 million digital registrations each year coming from the company’s current offering of about 1,500 titles that cover all major course offerings at colleges and universities.” What the blockchain and smart contract will allow it to do is to tap on otherwise “lost revenue”. In case you haven’t realized yet, reselling books is a massive industry that will only grow over time. Better yet, with digital books, it would be a breeze to transact and track each sale on the blockchain. Think of all the potential revenue with each subsequent sale, given the life cycle of a college textbook.The worldwide revenue of the eBook market increased significantly in 2021 by around 1.3 billion dollar to over 16.1 billion U.S. dollars.More reselling, transactions also means more knowledge is getting into the hands of those who needs it. It is a win-win for all. Pearson would have to design the smart contracts and NFTs very strategically. Perhaps even pricing it lower at the first purchase, but making back from the royalties in perpetuity. This would be a bold but interesting move for the old book publisher. - Is selling educational books as NFTs a good thing? - #startups #business #startupx #growth #success #socialmedia #culture #web3 #strategy #hacks #pearson #books #publisher #revenue #nfts #eth #btc #crypto #hackers #evil

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