‘Beware blanket dismissal.’ All endeavors need innovators in this changing environment. #BabyBathwater Ron Martinez’ cautionary comments arrived on the #FutureChat hashtag after our weekly live session had closed on Friday. But his point is a good one. To put together his tweets in sequence; Empathize a moment. Innovators are Promethean: may bring a benefit, but… Read More
Publishers' Forum in Berlin: 'Reconstructing Publishing'
The 2015 edition of Publishers’ Forum opened Monday (27th April) in Berlin with a determined tagline and programming to match: “How to Reconstruct Publishing: Competing Visions, Channels, and Audiences.” Produced by German publishing software maker Klopotek, the day was launched by welcoming comments from that company’s Klaus-Peter Stegen and by Global e-Book co-author Rüdiger Wischenbart (pictured), who is in… Read More
'No bookshop is an island': ALLi launches #Authors4Bookstores
At IndieReCon: Launching #Authors4Books Standing in this beautiful new Foyles store to launch ALLi’s Authors For Bookstores campaign, for a moment we can fool ourselves that reports of the decline of bricks-and-mortar bookshops are greatly exaggerated. The Alliance of Independent Authors’ (ALLi) Debbie Young (pictured)took to the floor of Friday’s IndieReCon event in London shortly before we… Read More
Publishing For Digital Minds Conference Opens London Book Fair Monday
Setting The Tone In A New Setting Putting together a major publishing conference program is never easy. But putting one together to open one of the year’s leading trade shows is particularly tricky: there are a lot of competing interests, most of them on the commercial side of the industry. And the audience for one… Read More
At PubSense In Charleston: Checking Out Indies’ Ebooks With SELF-e
More Than 17,000 Library Buildings You’d think — who wouldn’t? — that libraries were the place to find everything bookish. The assumption gains new interest with the news that the Cleveland-based OverDrive, leading distributor of ebooks to libraries, has been bought by Tokyo’s Rakuten, which also owns the Canadian ebook retailer Kobo and its self-publishing platform, Kobo… Read More
Do Personality Traits Have Any Business in Business? Yes, Says One Agent — With Authority
When The Gatekeeper Works For You There are many agents who are absolutely lovely people but who don’t command authority naturally. Why should you, as a writer, care about this? Literary agent Kristin Nelson doesn’t make you wait long for the answer: It’s simple: Authors with strong contracts have more successful careers. And say what… Read More
How widely does Kindle's garden really grow?
We know what Kindle can do for a single title. It was the Kindle Daily Deal for [Gail Carriger’s] Etiquette & Espionage that happened last week. Thousands and thousands of ebook copies sold during a short period of time. As we can now see from yesterday’s news, it was enough to propel the whole “Finishing School”… Read More
Is This Headline Taxing Your Attention Span?
How Bad Is This Going To Get? We Don’t Know The co-founder of the highly popular authors’ blog site Writer Unboxed, Therese Walsh, is also an accomplished novelist. Her latest book, The Moon Sisters, is from Penguin Random House’s Crown Publishing division. She runs a sophisticated monthly rotation of professional-class writers’ comment at Writer Unboxed, while… Read More
Oddest Book Title Of The Year: A Mercifully Short List
2014: ‘A Bumper Year For The Peculiar’ Publishing has a tendency to do things in waves. For example, certain conference organizers who shall remain nameless seem to take a reckless delight in scheduling their events much too close to other conferences and trade shows. This ensures that special bleary-vacant stare you see in the eyes… Read More
10 Bounces Of A Moving Target: Publishing Goes Mobile
Can You Hear Me Now? No, it’s not just you. Among our favorite confusing topics in digital publishing these days, mobile really gets around (sorry). And that’s because it’s thought by a great many people to be the coming thing. Maybe the already here thing. Maybe the you are so late thing. Forget plastics. Graduate to mobile.… Read More