ePublishing Week in Brief – December 16th to 20th, 2013
ePublishing Week in Brief – December 16th to 20th, 2013
Ten Bold Predictions for Ebooks and Digital Publishing in 2014
It’s been another exciting year for the publishing industry – perhaps the most dynamic in the history of the business. In 2013, all ebooks by publishers became subject to retailer price controls and ebook prices plummeted. At the same time, ebook revenue growth has tapered off even as many of the largest publishers still reported digital gains. A handful of ebook subscription businesses were launched and libraries won some key victories in their fight to bring ebooks from all publishers to their patrons.
Nobody saw it coming. Well, almost nobody. A team of publishing experts predicted in late 2012 some of the astounding developments we saw in 2013 for Digital Book World.
Obama’s Brother Is Self-Publishing an Autobiography to Set the Record Straight
Mark Obama Ndesandjo, President Obama’s half-brother, will address supposed inaccuracies in the president’s own memoir.
President Barack Obama’s half-brother is self-publishing an autobiography detailing the abuse his mother suffered at the hands of their father, the Associated Press reports. Mark Obama Ndesandjo is the son of Barack Obama Sr. and his third wife, Ruth Ndesandjo, a Jewish American woman.
Publishing houses say Alex Rodriguez tell-all book an unlikely story
Neither Random House nor HarperCollins seem to have heard of a Rodriguez book project, according to multiple high-ranking publishing sources.
Alex Rodriguez sure puts the ghost in the term “ghost writer.”
A recent published report has the embattled slugger “about to seal a multimillion dollar deal for a tell-all book” chronicling his feud with Major League Baseball in the Biogenesis scandal, and that two major publishing houses are “battling for the real A-Rod story,” with Rodriguez set to rake in an advance of at least $5 million.
Only problem is, neither Random House nor HarperCollins — the two houses mentioned in the report — seem to have heard of the Rodriguez book project, according to multiple high-ranking publishing sources.
Is the Publishing Industry Wasting Its Time on Tablets?
One of the anticipated major trends of 2013, at least according to the companies showcasing their platforms at last January’s Digital Book World event, was supposed to be online retail stores branded specifically to publishers and authors, essentially letting publishers cut out the retailer altogether when it can to ebooks, audiobooks, and other downloadable content. The move was targeted specifically to bring customers to the publishers’ websites to make their purchases, instead of relying on retailers like Amazon and Barnes and Noble, costing the rights’ holders a percentage of their sales.
But new data on how tablet owners actually consume content on their tablets may help publishers realize this isn’t the right venture to channel their resources into. StatCounter has released information showing that tablet owners make up for less than five percent of total internet usage globally, falling behind even smartphones for internet activity. Desktop computers still hold the top position, and by an unbelievably wide margin.
While that information had little impact on reading activity on tablets, what it does demonstrate is that reading consumers may be reading within their e-reader apps, but they’re simply not browsing the internet long enough to discover publisher-branded apps. They appear to be hopping over to their favorite book retailers’ websites, making their purchases, and having them sent directly to their devices or tablet apps.
http://goodereader.com/blog/e-book-news/is-the-publishing-industry-wasting-its-time-on-tablets
New digital publishing environments make it hard for publishers to retain control
There is a generally accepted view that publishers are in the content business and that the forms they publish that content has less importance than the content itself. But more and more, publishers are finding that their partners in publishing – the vendors, app development companies and digital newsstands – are taking at least partial control of their content.
For many publishers who have rushed to make sure their content is available through aggregation tools, or have built Facebook and other social media pages, the issue of content control is much discussed. Is it worth placing content in Flipboard or through Google’s Newsstand when the design of the content is controlled and the question can honestly be asked about who is really financially benefiting from the product – the aggregator or the publisher?
The situation is a little different inside the various app stores where publishers often use third party app developers or platforms that will not only provide the publishing solution or create the app, but then place the apps into the app stores themselves. The problem is that many of them do so under their own developer accounts. The idea is that this is a convenience and eases the process of getting the app into the store (and it does) – there is no need for the publisher to create their own developer accounts.