I know there has been 3 Star Trek: Encyclopedia (A reference guide to the Future) books...I have all 3. The third one was back in 1999 (the one that includes Voyager's season 4 and 5). I might have asked this before but I don't remember what the answer was. Is there ever going to be a 4th one anytime in the near future? Its almost 10 years since the last book.
Expensive non-fiction titles like the encyclopedia don't sell all that well anymore, so there are no plans for a further edition right now.
There are still non-fiction books from time to time, as the editors try to find out what will and won't sell in the current market, but these days it is indeed mostly "just" novels, novellas, short stories, and other forms of fiction.
Such projects just aren't money-makers anymore with all of the on-line resourses out there that are free.
If you are interested in Trek non-fiction there have been two recently, the Trek Lit companion Voyages of the Imagination, Captain Kirk's Guide to Women http://startrek.wikia.com/wiki/Captain_Kirk%27s_Guide_to_Women, and the upcoming Star Trek 101.
non-fiction is my favorite ST books. my real favorite is The Making of Deep Space Nine, by the Stevens'
I think the correct response is that the non-fiction books of the quality that was on offer in the venues it was offered and provided the marketing was given were poor sellers. This is a niche market. I think that if a quality product was done as an on-demand publication you'd get enough sales to justify it. I've said that before and in other threads I've started myself and I still believe it. Having access to something online is not the same as browsing a book. I can get answers to lots of questions about countries online; I still have an atlas and atlases are still published. Ditto for dictionaries and encyclopaedias of other types and still they're published, so that argument just doesn't wash.
^ Your logic doesn't remotely follow. Atlases and encyclopedias also cost much more per book than a Star Trek encyclopedia does and also, hard to believe as this may seem, there's a considerably higher demand for an encyclopedia that's about all life on planet Earth than there is about a related bunch of TV shows and movies. A Star Trek encyclopedia is a luxury item, really, not a reference book. The two have entirely different sales needs and also significantly different reader bases, so to compare them is fallacious. Having now used my SAT word of the day, let me also point out that the Star Trek Encyclopedia is also a) very expensive to produce, b) gets more expensive to produce with each subsequent revision because each revision adds material, and c) sells less with each revision because it isn't a vital reference work, it's a luxury item, a bit of fun to go with a piece of pop culture entertainment. Revisions of actual encyclopedias sell as well as previous volumes because the real world changes, and that affects a lot more people than the release of a fifth Star Trek TV series and a tenth movie.
Only a few weeks ago, news services were announcing that several well-known encyclopedias (inc. "World Book", IIRC) announced they were abandoning print copies of their product for the first time this year in favour of versions such as CD-ROMs and online subscription services.
I was meaning single-volume references like DK's Animal or the companion volumes to Life of Mammals, etc.; I honestly had forgotten things like World Book and Brittanica existed. I still think an on-demand publication could work given an order of sufficient size. Memory Alpha is great for reading up on the odd fact, but I still prefer flipping the pages...
I acknowledge that (think I did in the thread I started ages ago as well), hence the statement regarding an on-demand publication. If sufficient numbers of people were to pay up-front for a one-off in sufficient numbers to justify the expense, would it happen?
Nope, because the numbers for POD are an infinitesmal fraction of what "regular" print books do. Books like this do not depend on the hardcore fanbase, because the hardcore fanbase will buy it no matter what. A book as incredibly expensive as the Star Trek Encyclopedia needs a huge contingent of impulse buyers and more casual fans to pick it up. Those people are lost with a POD production, because they're not likely to ever even find out about it. Seriously, the numbers for eBooks and POD publications are miniscule -- we're talking less than 10% of what a print book that gets into a bookstore sells. That would be a far bigger financial disaster than printing another encyclopedia would be.
Even though I love my "luxury item", I gotta admit that I haven't read/used it in the last few years. I'm using the internet to get information. HOWEVER: I still would by the Encyclopedia when it's updated. It's my Bible. What can I say? And I somehow have the feeling that if STAR TREK (2009 film) does well and the hype starts again, there's a good chance that this book might be updated. I wouldn't even mind if the entries of Memory Alpha were used (they probably would) as long as I have shiny new pictures and a big fat book in my hands. *lol*