Thursday News: Simon & Schuster experiments with free content; why Verizon bought AOL; sexist protests against new Mad Max movie; and cool steampunk sculptures
Publishing NewsAdvertising / AOL / Art / Film / Foli / gender / mobile content / Simon & Schuster / steampunk / Verizon3 Comments
S&S Tries Geo-Targeting in New Marketing Outreach – Foli is a mobile content delivery service that will allow certain Simon & Schuster books to be viewed and read – for free – in a number of airports, museums, and hotels. Although users have to download the Foli app first, they will then have access to the content specifically available at a specific location. It’s an interesting concept, especially for venues like museums. Hotels are another venue where patrons might be likely to read a free book. I don’t know how such a service might affect airport news stands and bookstores, though, where travelers are more likely to purchase a full-price hardcover, book, but I’m definitely glad to see a Big 5 publisher experimenting with free content.
The availability of the e-books will last for three days while they are being accessed at the targeted venue. The service also allows the consumer to buy the book outright at any time. One of the feature titles in the program, David McCullough’s The Wright Brothers, displays how the publisher can use this technology in promoting specific titles. The biography, published this month, will be available at venues that tie into its theme, in all about 50 venues around the country. The title will be available via the National Air & Space Museum and other landmark locations associated with the brothers’ home state of North Carolina. –Publishers Weekly
Why AOL Is Worth $4.4B to Verizon (And It Ain’t HuffPo) – A very interesting analysis of the Verizon acquisition of AOL, which focuses on the advertising power of AOL, as well as Verizon’s ambition to become a provider of original content, similar to Netflix, although it may be looking to use advertising to fund the content, more in the tradition of basic television networks than subscription services and channels. AOL has apparently grown into an advertising empire of sorts, with a built-in subscribership, and if Verizon is looking to monetize content and content delivery, AOL may be a powerful partner in those ambitions.
“AOL has successfully built a robust ad tech stack with assets across mobile, social, video, and programmatic for both advertisers and publishers,” wrote MoffettNathanson analyst Craig Moffett this morning. “It has premium audience measurement and attribution capabilities, as well as content creation and distribution technologies.”
The real AOL is an advertising powerhouse, growing at a fearsome clip. That’s what Verizon is buying. Well, that and a bunch of zombie dial-up subscribers, the 2.1 million lost souls who still pay AOL a monthly tithe to access the internet. –Wired
Furious about Furiosa: Misogynists are losing it over Charlize Theron’s starring role in Mad Max: Fury Road – Although the extreme misogyny we’re seeing in certain infamous movements has been dismissed by some as part of the backlash that signals the growing social, economic, and political power of women, it is at best an inconvenient obstacle to gender equity and at worst a real danger. This ridiculous protest of Charlize Theron’s starring role in the new Mad Max installment definitely seems to be more annoying than dangerous, with its claims that Theron’s role is “ruining women for men, and men for women.” Whatever the hell that means. Still, this particular backlash provides a sense of how very frothy some of this rhetoric has become. And it makes me even more grateful for the news that Meryl Streep is funding a writing lab for female screenwriters over 40. Now, if we could just get these misogynists to take a few courses on geography and cultural imperialism:
You might think that someone this worried about the legacy of the original Mad Max might have noticed somewhere along the way that Mad Max is not actually a “piece of American culture” at all. It was an Australian film, filmed in Australia, directed by an Australian, and starring an American citizen who’d been living in Australia since the age of twelve.
I’m guessing that the director of Fury Road might have a somewhat more nuanced understanding of the original Mad Max than someone who doesn’t even know what country the movie was made in, especially given that the director of Fury Road, the director of the original Mad Max, the director of The Road Warrior and the director of Beyond Thunderdome are actually all the very same person. –We Hunted The Mammoth
Russian Artist Creates Steampunk Animals From Old Car Parts, Watches And Electronics – So very cool.
Russian artist Vigor Verniy has managed to create truly spectacular works of art using old compartment from spare parts and junk. Working the metal objects into steampunk inspired animals is no easy feat, yet one that Verniy manages to do with great success – certain parts move, bringing the already detailed sculpture to life. –One More Post
Slight correction – Wilbur was born in Indiana. Orville was born in Ohio.
That skeletal cat-bat whatever? WANT. The care and detail with which the artist crafted those pieces is breathtaking: the bird’s spread wings, the tilt of the cat’s head, which made me laugh out loud. This is how I will think of steampunk from now on.
I’ve been following the AOL/Verizon story with interest since I’m a section leader (Erotic Writing/Books and Writers Community) at Compuserve. Yes, there’s still a Compuserve and they’re owned by AOL. We’ve been together as a community since at least the late 80s/early 90s, so it would be heartbreaking to many of us to have things fall apart under new ownership. However, I remain optimistic that we’ll still be chugging along.