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Amazon is offering new levels of service which would require publishers and third party distributors to pay more to get featured access on the Amazon site. One unnamed publisher said that this was extortion. Of course, it makes sense that no one would go on the record to accuse Amazon of criminal (and hence defamatory) conduct. What I thought was most ironic about the piece was the complaint that Amazon wasn’t pushing quality books instead of basing it on a pay to play. Coop has always been about quality? I had no idea. Via Publishers Weekly.

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MediaBistro links to a USA Today interview with Glenn Beck whose book empire pulls in gobs more money than his tv empire. Beck promotes books on his TV show and he publishes books under his own name that are co written by several authors. If you recall, Beck has a copublishing deal with Simon & Schuster and is pulling in $13 million in for his publishing efforts. From Forbes:

He has managed to monetize virtually everything that comes out of his mouth. He gets $13 million a year from print (books plus the ten-issue-a-year magazine Fusion). Radio brings in $10 million. Digital (including a newsletter, the ad-supported Glennbeck.com and merchandise) pulls in $4 million. Speaking and events are good for $3 million and television for $2 million.

Is Beck the new Oprah? If so, how scary is that? Via MediaBistro.

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You would think that Ashton Kutcher and Demi Moore are the poster children for overexposed. Is there anything we really don’t know about them? In case your curiosity is not yet satiated, Demi Moore is coming to the rescue with her memoir that she sold to Harper Collins for over $2 million. Good luck with that. Via MediaBistro. I’m not sure what the trends are here in the US, but the Guardian reported that celebrity book sales were down in 2009.

Celebrity books sold badly last Christmas and their sales dipped steeply.

The Times said that the celebrity book sales were down 25-30%.

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The Wall Street Journal is reporting that the Blackberry platform might be ported to a tablet by the end of the year. Will Xmas 2010 be the year of the tablet? Last year it seemed everyone and their cousin gave or received iTouches. Via Gizmodo.

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Starbucks will be offering free wifi at all its US locations beginning July 1. As if I didn’t already have enough excuses to go and get fattening lattes.

Related posts:

1. Midweek News Links: Free Wifi at BN, Bloggers, and Writing
2. Thursday Midday Links Roundup: Education is moving toward digital
3. Tuesday Midday Links: Harlequin Horizon’s, A self publishing venture

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After a dismal few quarters, HarperCollins experienced a small rise for the fiscal first quarter. Sales were slightly down (1.5%). Sales of ebooks accounted for 4% of the adult group revenue. Most of the profit came from restructuring and not from sales.

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The Wall Street Journal accuses Amazon of stockpiling cash by paying late on its bills by up to 72 days or longer. I understand that late payment is fairly standard in the industry and the writer of the article asserts that Amazon has never made a profit, something the SEC filings for the past five years would dispute. However, if Amazon’s posted profitability rests solely on delaying cash payments, it seems, as Jose Furtado notes, that “Such things won’t flow Amazon’s way forever.”

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Companies are trying to get easier access to ebooks for students including text to speech enabled ebooks which will help students with physical or learning disabilities. I think this is great and I hope the content creators will see that this is a social good that won’t create economic harm for them. Persona Non Data writes that K-12 online learning will mushroom in the next few years. My tot’s fine motor skills need some help. She has a hard time using the mouse. That’s a fair impediment to online learning.

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Sarah Weinman discusses the New York Times article by Motoko Rich about the rising influence of Glenn Beck as a mover of books. Beck apparently is a big thriller fan and he’s been having a steady stream of thriller authors on his show and those thriller authors are then selling many books. It’s a double edged sword for some authors. Andrew Gross reported having received emails calling his work “lefty bullshit” and accusations that associating with Beck means that the reader would not buy another Gross book.

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I’m really beginning to salivate over the MS Courier. Gizmodo has more exclusive design and function leaks. My fear is that this device will be too expensive, much like what I think killed the UMPC market before it even got off the ground. With the rise of netbooks, I think consumers don’t want to pay in excess of 3 figures for a computing device.

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Jill Myles has a quiz for the Nalini Singh fans over at the Oddshots. If you want to hump things into submission, you are a Changeling.

Related posts:

1. Thursday Midday Links Roundup
2. Thursday Midday Links Roundup: DWEBs Still Thwarting the Women
3. Thursday Midday Links: FTC, one more time