In my last blog I listed a number of truths and untruths about self-publishing vs traditional publishing, so I thought I would continue in this vein to tackle some other subjects on which I believe that authors require greater clarity.  Read more »

With those words Tim O’Reilly CEO of O'Reilly Media brought the curtain down on seven years of Tools of Change with the shock announcement of the end of both the TOC conferences and the TOC blog. Read more »

The self-publishing industry has boomed over the last year—or maybe more accurately has been accepted. And no-one on Twitter and with an interest in the book industry can have missed the deluge of articles hailing the sector—with an added kick at the apparently dead dog of traditional publishing for good measure. Read more »

It's crisis. Yes, still. When it will end? Nobody knows. Although, according to Bernard Wientjes of the Dutch labour union VNO-NCW, the crisis will end on 1 January 2016. Right… From previous crises, or attenuated variants thereof, the book world experienced little to no problems. Books are traditionally sold mostly to people who have a bit more to spend. You can at least clearly state that the largest group of book buyers is not on the lower end of the income level. Read more »

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 »

The Spanish book industry in general and the media in particular are focusing almost exclusively on aspects of digitization that have to do with the sale of digital content (e-books). However, there is a wide range of options for using the opportunities offered by technology to support the promotion and sale of more physical books, which currently represent around 98% of the Spanish market, with ebooks currently at only 2%. Read more »

For the first time this year, our Digital Census survey asked specific questions of authors. Yes, authors, like they’re important. Huh? Read more »

Clark Kokich nailed it for me in this article in Forbes: "It’s less about advertising and more about creating an experience that transforms what it means to be a customer of a brand." Basically, the persuasion industry is in free fall. Read more »

News comes out of New York overnight that Brightline, yet another new publisher, has entered the e-book market. Read more »

It is the beginning of September and in bookshops, shelves are near collapsing under the sheer weight of future best-sellers. Of over four hundred books published, only a dozen will actually be successful. Read more »