Home

Can publishers disintermediate Amazon?

Submitted by Agent Orange on Fri, 04/05/2013 - 12:10

So, RIP the Agency Model. You won’t be missed. What is simply staggering is that publishers thought they could rewrite the laws of capitalism by trying to set the price of a product that they were not actually selling. Read more »

Tags:

Good reads for all

Submitted by Philip Jones on Tue, 04/02/2013 - 16:54

The acquisition of Goodreads by Amazon serves as a reminder of how bifurcated the book business now is. As bookshops waited for a busy Easter weekend, on twitter and other social networks the commentariat declared 'game over' in the battle for the future reader, after Amazon announced that it had bought the bookish social network late Thursday. Read more »

Tags:

Selling direct – what you need to know

Submitted by Firstygroup on Thu, 03/28/2013 - 13:02

The concept of selling direct to consumers (D2C) is, traditionally, alien to most publishers. For centuries, their route to market has been almost exclusively through intermediaries. Then along came digital publishing with a bundle of technologies that gave publishers the opportunity to bypass the intermediaries and sell direct to their readers. This prospect looked interesting. Despite being an industry populated largely by non-technical people, they had recently got to grips with converting their print backlists into digital books. Read more »

Tags:

The e-book in the library

Submitted by Philip Jones on Wed, 03/27/2013 - 15:03

The Government-commissioned report into library e-lending, led by William Sieghart, has finally released its findings. On the surface it looks like all sides have been listened to, which is a polite way of saying that this is a report that seeks to be all things to all parties. Yet it does have an edge, particularly over the issue of remote lending. Read more »

Tags:

Thriving in the present, looking to the future

Submitted by Sophie Rochester on Mon, 03/25/2013 - 15:31

In the dystopian series Black Mirror (Channel 4), Charlie Brooker’s skill is to anticipate a technological future that seems at once terrifyingly feasible and fantastical. For those who haven’t been watching, in one episode it imagines a woman bringing her deceased partner back to life by piecing his character together via his social media updates, or a cold interactive world where the only reality is a TV talent show and the outside world is never seen.
  Read more »

Tags:

Do digital ostriches dream of electric sand?

Submitted by Agent Orange on Wed, 03/20/2013 - 12:52

 

There can be a certain hilarious magnificence to denial – the huge popularity of the Bruno Ganz Downfall meme is ample testament to that. Read more »

Tags:

A mixed economy

Submitted by Philip Jones on Tue, 03/19/2013 - 14:37

The growth in the e-book market is not linear, but that does not mean that its impact won't be. Data released by Bowker/BML ahead of it Books and the Consumer Conference (20th March) suggests that while consumers enjoy a mix of e-book and print book purchasing, their choices may mean they have less chance to enjoy this diversity in the future. Read more »

Tags:

Off the Page and in the centre

Submitted by Matt Railton on Mon, 03/18/2013 - 19:10

London is brimming with creative digital talent that sits on the doorsteps of the country's publishing powerhouses... but many rarely meet to talk business, let alone work together. That’s why we’re starting “Off the Page”, a new event series that brings together the publishing, arts and creative technology sectors to look at ways that they can learn from each other. Read more »

Tags:

Off the Page: Narrative, the glue that binds

Submitted by Dean Johnson on Mon, 03/18/2013 - 14:56

I gave a keynote at The Mobile Show in Dubai last May, where I emphasised the importance of an engaging narrative in almost everything we produce.

I made the point that narrative wasn’t the preserve of publishers, words had many routes to a page (be that paper or digital) and more options were opening up to connect authors, creatives and narrators of all shapes and sizes with their audience. Read more »

Tags:

Publishers: go hybrid!

Submitted by Timo Boezeman on Thu, 03/14/2013 - 09:28

People who know me, know that I like to draw comparisons with other industries to clarify where the book world is heading to. Usually, I do this with the music industry, simply because it has the most direct parallels, and at some other occasions the game industry and film world. The reason I do this, is not only because I’m convinced that they’ve already dealt with all the issues we are facing right now (meaning the digitization of our products and the introduction and implementation new business models), but also because I strongly believe in learning from other’s mistakes. Read more »

Tags: