‘A long day. Full of complete and utter nonsense.’ That’s the author Hugh Howey writing about Wednesday (1st July), when Amazon’s Kindle Direct Publishing (KDP) Select payout structure officially changed from its original per-borrow plan to a per-page-read plan. Howey, no stranger to post-apoc poesy, was less than impressed with the run-for-your-life! reactions of many of his… Read More
Parallel protests of Amazon
Pitchforks United: The protests expand… As I write this, the number of signatories to the new German-language offener brief an Amazon, open letter to Amazon, has jumped by nearly 200 in a single day. There were 1,188 yesterday. There are 1,354 today. Melissa Eddy at The New York Times takes care to point out to us that those supporters include… Read More
#FutureChat recap: How can we ease the summer's debate?
To ease the summer’s publishing debates, just hold a #FutureChat, and the biting and bickering become a spirited but friendly exchange of views and counter-views. One of the things many of us appreciate more each week is how responsibly our FutureBook community moves from issue to issue. Newcomers are welcomed and seem to understand immediately that we… Read More
#FutureChat: How can we ease the summer's debate?
Just in time for those reports that Big Five publisher Simon & Shuster (S&S) is, like Hachette, in negotiations with Amazon, as covered here by Sarah Shaffi at The Bookseller. As Greg Bensinger and Shira Ovide at the Wall Street Journal quoted Les Moonves, CEO of CBS, which owns S&S, “It’s going to be a very interesting thing to watch.” That… Read More
This Week: Will Publishing Change The Tone?
It’s Never Too Late To Embrace Your Cognitive Dissonance Here’s an interesting irony for those following — or being battered to bits by — the Amazon-Hachette mania that’s enraging so many people in book publishing in this loud, hot summer. Edan Lepucki, author of California, the Stephen Colbert-promoted Hachette book, is married to Patrick Brown — the main spokesperson for… Read More
EXTRA ETHER: Tim Ferriss' 4-Hour Banning
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