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Digital media has taken over the print media to a great extent. Print circulation of the most popular newspapers has come down to a great extent as more and more people turn towards the Internet to know what is happening around  the world.

The next blow to the publishing organizations came from the educational and academic institutes as they started aiming to enter digital publishing. Almost every day now, these institutions are engaged in digitizing content, collecting new data and developing software tools.  Creation of digital resources has been possible through short term resource commitment and one-time funding grants.

Digital printing however requires funding on a constant basis as compared to the printed books. It is very important upgrading and keeping up with current trends on the software systems and their dependent platforms. The very nature of digital resources is continuous change and growth and constantly updated content. This has necessitated government agencies, foundations and universities to sustain resources online through constant funding. They now turn to academics to adapt and act as publishing entrepreneurs.

One important aspect that mushrooms here is the vast differences between the mindset of the e-entrepreneur and that of a scholar. Scholars usually oversee academic resources online and they are not really shielded from traditional market forces, being raised in purely academic background. A completely different mindset is required to deal with the competitive and ruthless Internet landscape. In other words, even as you preserve the scholarly values, you must adapt to the entrepreneurial values necessary to survive and hang on in the world of Internet.

There are several important aspects required to create and sustain digital projects.

•    Realize that grants must be used only for starting the project and not for continued sustenance.

•    Sustainability means more than just recovering cost. It signifies a continued striving for growth.

•    Scholars tend to shy away from the very word marketing. On the Internet, it is absolutely vital to    enhance the value of their academic publications by creating an effective marketing strategy. Marketing is the only method through which you can improve visibility and attract users in order to ensure continued support from government agencies, philanthropies, host universities, advertisers and corporate sponsors.

•    Keeping in mind the very high cost of environment online, it is essential for academic resource projects to improve chances for sustainability and reduce costs by opting for mergers and collaborations.

•    Competitive world requires strategic planning for survival. It is necessary to develop strategic partnerships and effective marketing plans to successfully accomplish missions. A lot of scholarly projects on the Internet continue to fail miserably due to a strong dislike of commercialism by the academics.

In order to transition to digitize publishing in a smooth manner, it is very necessary to create a mindset among project leaders that clearly includes and accepts both “commercial” and “academic” economies. They must be able to successfully work under accountability and competition pressure, reinventing and innovating on a continuous basis. Only this will ensure survival of academic resources online.