Libraries: From Info Vaults To Creative Hubs The American Library Association’s (ALA) Midwinter Meeting in Boston, has just closed with some impressive numbers to report. Gary Price at Library Journal reports that a total 11,716 people attended the five-day event—librarians, library workers and supporters including 3,622 exhibitors. This makes the 2016 event some 1,000 people larger… Read More
From Boston's #TheMuse: Whatever happened to 'author-ity'?
When Everybody Publishes, Is Anybody An Authority? The Muse and The Marketplace has opened on Friday, 1st May, with of authority in digital times was followed Friday (1st May) by our weekly #FutureChat from The Bookseller’s The FutureBook. The Muse annually draws some 800 attendees and is produced by the highly respected Grub Street creative writing center,… 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
A New Architecture Of Algorithms: Could Trajectory Make Books ‘Discoverable’ At Last?
‘To Read More Books In A Similar Vein’ As the book publishing industry heads into its first major conference of the year this week — Digital Book World (hash it #DBW15 with us) in New York City — we learn now that we won’t be seeing one late-breaking major development on the program. And that’s not the… Read More
'Grace notes for ebooks': A new Trajectory for discoverability
When the machines read your book The Bookseller on the stands in London this morning reports that Bowker — the ProQuest-owned US ISBN agency and publishing research firm — is in final talks for a partnership with a company called Trajectory. The aim at Bowker is to offer authors and small publishers a new way to generate… Read More
To Arms: AWP's Boston Foray
Writing on the Ether is a collection of news and perspectives on publishing. It is written by journalist and critic Porter Anderson for Jane Friedman and it appears at JaneFriedman.com each Thursday. Sponsorship opportunities are available and offer generous promotion. Join us on Tuesdays at Ed Nawotka’s and Frankfurt Book Fair’s Publishing Perspectives for the new Ether for Authors column. Read More