BEA’s’ Director of International Affairs Rüdiger Wishenbart’s new Global Ebook Report cites continental Europe’s ebooks “stalling even earlier” than in the US and UK. Read More
Is A Fan A ‘Quantified Reader’?
Michael Bhaskar: ‘Fans are critical to what it means to be a publisher today’ Historically, publishing meant amplification. “Making stuff available,” Canelo Publishing’s Michael Bhaskar told our Berlin audience. Putting something into print was enough to amplify it. But actually, now, on the Internet, when everything can be made available automatically, simply having stuff available is no longer… Read More
‘Publishing Goes Pop,’ Part 1: Can Reading Find True Fandom At BookCon?
‘There Was No Interest At BEA In…Readers’ BookExpo America (BEA) makes its annual appearance next week (27-29 May). It’s one of the world’s big-three publishing trade shows of the year, preceded in April by London Book Fair and followed in October by the largest of all, Frankfurt Book Fair. And while the show officially ends on Friday the 29th, it… Read More
An Author Speaks Directly To Publishers: Kathrin Passig’s Commentary In Berlin
‘You’re Giving Amazon Another Advantage’ I know you’re all very nice people that are a pleasure to work with, and I know you do things in this roundabout way because you love talking and I even love talking to you… But when you offer workflows that are slower, less functional and more complicated than what… 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
Monday: Berlin’s ‘Senior’ Publishers’ Forum Convenes In A Digitally Youthful Industry
‘The Most Senior In Continental Europe’ There are, it turns out, myriad ways to structure and calibrate the discussions and debates and conversations that go into a good publishing conference. Rüdiger Wischenbart This year, one of the most interesting contextualizations awaits us in Berlin. There, international publishing specialist and consultant Rüdiger Wischenbart is at the helm… Read More
As The World Gets Smaller, Authors’ Jobs Get Bigger
‘An Entire Chain Of Questions That You Have To Ask’ We have a very difficult debate about subscription models or flat rate models because some publishers are afraid that they rather ruin their traditional way of making money. So very quickly you end up in an entire chain of questions that you have to ask. That’s… Read More
Buggy Whipped Into Collaboration
BERLIN — “The market for reading may be expanding significantly,” Brian O’Leary told the plenary session at Klopotek’s Publishers’ Forum, “but the gains are seen almost entirely outside the prevailing supply chain. Fixed on the creation, management and sale of physical and digital objects, publishers view forms of writing and reading as potential threats to… Read More
Publishing's "Metamorphoses" at Klopotek 2014's Berlin Forum
BERLIN, Germany — For “ten years I have been in charge of this conference,”Helmut von Berg told the Publishers’ Forum assembly here Tuesday evening. “And I wondered what changed in that time.” The director of Klopotek, the publishing software company, von Berg paused with the timing that comes of a decade’s practice at conference-closing speeches. Then: “I had no immediate… Read More