Apr 30 2009
The LA Times held a panel this past week on the issue of publishing. The panel, moderated by the Times book editor David Ullin, included former PW editor-in-chief, publishing consultant and author of So Many Books, So Little Time Sara Nelson; Richard Nash, former head of Soft Skull Press; Otis Chandler, founder of the Goodreads(…)
Apr 8 2009
see more Lolcats and funny pictures Alternatively, I suppose you could title this piece How Jeff Bezos Pwned Publishing. A few weeks ago, a number of mainstream publishers attended SXSW, a festival of music and media culture. SXSW is peopled with macbooks and iphones and music fans. SXSW started out as a musical festival and has(…)
Mar 17 2009
Nearly every segment of Penguin publishing showed improvement in 2008 helping the company achieve a growth of 26% over 2007 and a profit margin of 10.3%. Sales were up 3% not withstanding the increased value of the dollar. Penguin had one or more #1 New York Time Bestseller 94% of the year, their authors brought(…)
Mar 16 2009
Feb 10 2009
Twitterers broke the news this morning that HarperCollins layoffs are occurring right now. No names have been released yet. Following on the heels of two dismal quarters, this should come as no surprise. Harper is also closing the “Collins Division.” According to PublishersMarketplace, the Collins’ imprint president and publisher is leaving as well as the(…)
Feb 9 2009
Anderson News announced last month it would charge 7c per copy to the publisher for the distribution of magazines and books. Publishers balked and refused to ship the content to Anderson News. Now Anderson News has suspended “Normal Business Activities.” The distributor services 40,000 outlets including 2300 Wal-mart stores. Most reports speak only about the(…)
Feb 6 2009
It was over a year ago, I think, that Samhain and Kensington announced that Samhain would produce a mass market imprint under the Kensington flag. Lynne Connolly broke the news that the venture is no longer going forward: “By mutual agreement Kensington and Samhain have dissolved our co-venture agreement. Current circumstances being what they do(…)
Feb 3 2009
Hilary Sares, a Senior Editor for Kensington, has left. Sares acquired books for Aphrodisia, Brava, and Zebra; but was primarily responsible for the Aphrodisia line. Whether this is a voluntary separation or a layoff is unknown. Her main line, Aphrodisia, is being cut in half . Note: Jessica Faust, the blogger-agent at Book Ends blog, has since(…)
Feb 1 2009
Before I get to the topic of the day, I want to briefly address DRM. eBook consumers HATE DRM. It turns honest customers into criminals as we strip the DRM of digital files to make sure that we can read on the digital device of our choice. It increases the cost of digital publishing. It(…)
Jan 28 2009
According to Lois McMaster Bujold’s Myspace page , Borders has decided not to stock Horizons in the store. It will be available online only. This is really sad because I think that Bujold is an author that really deserves a broader audience. This will obviously not help. It’s hard to say what is the decision behind this.(…)
Jan 25 2009
With the book industry suffering from the recession despite the seemingly erroneous claims that books are recession proof, it’s with little dismay that I look to the one part of the industry that is actually experiencing growth. It is, of course, ebooks. According to the November AAP numbers, every category of retail book business suffered(…)
Jan 22 2009
First, a mini lesson in copyright and distribution. When authors sell the distribution rights to their book, they are actually selling the right to print, publicize, and sometimes digitally distribute the work in certain geographical territories. The author (via her agent usually) sells the right to publish the work in specific formats; sometimes one publisher(…)
Jan 20 2009
A notice at Lori Devoti’s blog indicates that Juno Press is to become an imprint of Pocket books. The post says that the existing acquiring Juno editor, Paula Guran, will be working with Jennifer Heddle of Pocket. I’m not sure whether this is merely a distribution deal like the one Pocket has with Ellora’s Cave(…)
Jan 15 2009
Six degrees of separation theory was a fraud. Stanley Milgram, a controversial psychologist, coined this term after asking “people to give a letter to other people they knew by name, then he tracked how long it took for each letter to end up in the hands of a person the original sender didn’t know in(…)
Jan 6 2009
more animals I’m worried, readers. I am worried about publishing as a business. My worries do not stem from used sales. My worries do not stem from piracy of digital books. My worry is that publishing will not take this opportunity to innovate. Anita Elberse’s article in the Wall Street Journal only increases my concerns.(…)
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