Authors & Publishers, Take Note: Amazon’s Rooftop Media Acquisition is About Platform, Not Content – Nate Hoffelder argues that Amazon’s acquisition of Rooftop, of which they were already a client, is more about platform than content, specifically in the way of “ACX crossed with KDP crossed with Youtube,” such that ... more >
Fair Use Victory in HathiTrust Litigation – So this is the one about how the Author’s Guild sued the HathiTrust and lost. The HathiTrust — comprised of more than 80 academic and research institutions — created a digital library (the HathiTrust Digital Library) and then digitized more than ten million ... more >
Do Critics Make Good Novelists? – This week’s Bookends column — between Daniel Mendelsohn and Leslie Jamison — is a pretty interesting contemplation of the relationship between literary critic and novelist. Mendelsohn seems to suggest that critics are unsuited to writing fiction, while Jamison suggests that the prejudice against critics ... more >
Comic Artist Yumi Sakugawa On Friend-Love, Identity And Art – Although not publishing news, per se, this is a really lovely interview with Yumi Sakugawa, whose work investigates, among other things, the kinds of relationships we have with people who are not romantic partners, but who, nonetheless, contribute substantially to ... more >
In Hookups, Inequality Still Reigns – Women don’t really find sexual satisfaction from hookups per this article but for some, the trade off is worth it. “For Kim Huynh, a 29-year-old filmmaker in San Francisco, sacrificing a reliable orgasm for sex without the burden of commitment was a conscious decision. After a ... more >
J.K. Rowling announces new movie franchise set in wizarding world – If you aren’t ready to say goodbye to Harry Potter series, then this will be the best news ever. Rowling is going to adapt “Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them” a Hogwarts textbook into a movie featuring the ... more >