The largest media development since the Gutenberg printing press is coming. The full force has not yet hit, but the waves are lapping our shores. Computers, scanners, printers and their possibilities have changed everything. How we write, how we distribute (and eventually how we think about publication) are already different. For example, we now have the possibility of becoming publishers ourselves.
As any writer knows, the most difficult part of the creative process is getting an established publisher interested. Such publishers are almost impossible to simply approach. Instead you must use an individual or concern, known as your agent. He, she, or it approaches the publisher on your behalf and only then is the work considered.
Since a publisher is also a bureaucracy, the various levels within are all consulted as well. Particularly powerful in these days of book-sale decline is the sales section, which attempts to ascertain whether your project has wide enough appeal. If it is guessed that your project will sell, it may then be approved.