somersault

The new Common English Bible (http://CommonEnglishBible.com) is #7 in unit sales and #10 in dollar sales on the CBA Bible Translation Best Seller list for the month of April (http://cbaonline.org/nm/documents/BSLs/Bible_Translations.pdf). This marks the fourth month the Common English Bible (Twitter @CommonEngBible – http://twitter.com/CommonEngBible) has been on the Unit Sales list (moving up from #10) and the first month it’s appeared on the Dollar Sales list since its release last fall.

“The broad acceptance of the Common English Bible by scholars, consumers, and book sellers is gratifying,” says Paul Franklyn, PhD, associate publisher. “It confirms our decision to create an academically rigorous yet naturally understandable translation for 21st century English readers; a translation from the original Hebrew, Aramaic, and Greek that’s built on common ground from the bottom up.”

The Common English Bible’s popularity has soared since it was first released last September. In addition to being a repeat best seller,

·         it was named one of the top 10 religion stories of 2011 by leading journalists of the Religion Newswriters Association

·         people are printing its verses in calligraphy when they LIKE the Facebook page http://facebook.com/LiveTheBible

·         a Lenten PowerPoint^® presentation of nature scenes in vivid color photography combined with scripture verses from the Common English Bible has been viewed, downloaded, and embedded more than 10,000 times (http://CommonEnglishBible.com/CEB/LentDownloads and http://slideshare.net/CommonEnglishBible)

·         200 bloggers are participating in the “Common English Bible Change Your Heart and Life” blog tour (http://CommonEnglishBible.com/CEB/blogtour) through Pentecost Sunday in May (Twitter hashtag #CEBtour – http://twitter.com/#!/search/realtime/%23CEBTour).

·         the Common English Bible’s video “Who Does God Love” (vimeo.com/CommonEnglishBible) has registered more than 1,000 views and blog embeds (see above)

·         the Common English Bible text, including the Apocrypha, is available to search for free online at Bible Gateway (http://www.biblegateway.com/versions/Common-English-Bible-CEB/), YouVersion.com (http://www.youversion.com/versions/ceb), and the translation’s website

·         more than 6,000 people subscribe to the email Common English Bible “Verse of the Day” delivered daily to personal email inboxes from Bible Gateway (http://www.biblegateway.com/newsletters/)

·         and churches are using the translation to read through the Bible in a year (e.g. http://www.fourthchurch.org/bibleyear.html).

The Common English Bible is a collaboration of 120 Bible scholars and editors, 77 reading group leaders, and more than 500 average readers from around the world. The translators – from 24 denominations in American, African, Asian, European, and Latino communities – represent such academic institutions as Asbury Theological Seminary, Azusa Pacific University, Bethel Seminary, Denver Seminary, Princeton Theological Seminary, Seattle Pacific University, Wheaton College, Yale University, and many others.

The Common English Bible is written in contemporary idiom at the same reading level as the newspaper USA TODAY—using language that’s comfortable and accessible for today’s English readers. More than half-a-million copies of the Bible are in print, including an edition with the Apocrypha. The Common English Bible is available online and in 20 digital formats. A Reference Bible edition and a Daily Companion devotional edition are now also available. Additionally, Church/Pew Bibles, Gift and Award Bibles, Large Print Bibles, and Children’s Bible editions will be in stores soon, joining the existing Thinline Bibles, Compact Thin Bibles, and Pocket-Size Bibles, bringing the total variety of Common English Bible stock-keeping units (SKUs) to more than 40.

Visit CommonEnglishBible.com to see comparison translations, learn about the translators, get free downloads, and more.

The Common English Bible is sponsored by the Common English Bible Committee, an alliance of five publishers that serve the general market, as well as the Christian Church (Disciples of Christ) (Chalice Press), Presbyterian Church (USA) (Westminster John Knox Press), Episcopal Church (Church Publishing, Inc.), United Church of Christ (The Pilgrim Press), and The United Methodist Church (Abingdon Press).

For a media review copy of the Common English Bible and to schedule an interview with Paul Franklyn, please contact Diane Morrow, dmorrow@tbbmedia.com, at 800.927.1517, x106.

Also see our previous blogpost, “Computers: The New Consumers?.”

How does the Internet of Things—where not only is everyone connected to the Internet, but also everything—impact your publishing strategy and planning? Let Somersault (@smrsault) help you think it all through.

And bookmark and use daily the SomersaultNOW online dashboard; especially the Futurist News tab.

A publishing mainstay capitulates to electronic technology. In The New York Times blog Media Decoder (@mediadecodernyt), Julie Bosman (@juliebosman) reports that “after 244 years, the Encyclopædia Britannica (@Britannica) is going out of print.”

Those coolly authoritative, gold-lettered reference books that were once sold door-to-door by a fleet of traveling salesmen and displayed as proud fixtures in American homes will be discontinued, company executives said.

In an acknowledgment of the realities of the digital age — and of competition from the website Wikipedia — Encyclopædia Britannica will focus primarily on its online encyclopedias and educational curriculum for schools. The last print version is the 32-volume 2010 edition, which weighs 129 pounds and includes new entries on global warming and the Human Genome Project.

“It’s a rite of passage in this new era,” Jorge Cauz, the president of Encyclopædia Britannica Inc., a company based in Chicago, said in an interview. “Some people will feel sad about it and nostalgic about it. But we have a better tool now. The website is continuously updated, it’s much more expansive and it has multimedia.”

Read this in full.

According to the Financial Times (@ftmedia), "The emergence of the Web decimated sales of Britannica. From a peak of 120,000 sets sold in 1990, sales fell sharply, with just 8,500 sets of the 2010 edition shipped."

A.J. Jacobs (@ajjacobs), who read the Encyclopædia Britannica from beginning to end and lived to write about it in The Know-It-All: One man's Humble Quest to Become the Smartest Person in the World, says,

...the [printed] Britannica encouraged serendipitous discoveries. Look up Abbott and Costello, and you might be lured in by abalones or Absalom, who died after his luxurious hair got caught in a tree.

...physicality has its rewards....For decades, the Britannica served a symbolic purpose. Fill your living room shelf with encyclopedias, and you were announcing, "Yes, we are an intellectually curious family." A mounted moose head, but for the brainy.

Read the obituary he wrote in full.

Let Somersault (@smrsault) help you navigate the revolutionary changes occurring in 21st century publishing.

And be sure to bookmark and use daily the SomersaultNOW online dashboard.

Simply Zesty (@SimplyZesty) / Simply Viral (@simplyviral) scouted this TED (@tedtalks) talk of YouTube (@YouTube) trends manager Kevin Allocca (@shockallocca) speaking at a TEDYouth (@TEDYouth) event on the 3 reasons a video goes viral:

·         Tastemakers: when influential people discover new videos and introduce those videos to their followers

·         Participation: when viewers of a video become motivated enough to produce another version of the video

·         Unexpectedness: when a video contains surprises, especially in a humorous manner.

Allocca says over 48 hours of video are uploaded to YouTube every minute.

Also see our other blogposts about viral videos:

• "P&G Wins Hearts & Top Marks with Olympic Video Spots"
• "Video: What a Wonderful World"
• "The Art of Hand-Bound Books"
• "McDonald's Behind-the-Scenes Video Goes Viral"
• "Seeding, Not Quality, is Vital to Make Videos Viral"
• "What Makes a Story Popular and Viral?"
• “How ‘A Charlie Brown Christmas’ Reveals the True Meaning of Viral Content”
• “Infographic: Understanding Viral Content Marketing”
• "A Video About a Poster Masks a Bookstore's Promotion"
• "Unlikely Videos Go Viral"
• "LEGO Celebrates 80th Birthday With Animated 'Short' Film"
• "Video: The Viral Benefits of a Satisfied Customer"
• "Video: PSA Uses Whimsy to Communicate Grim Message"

What principles have you identified that contribute to a video going viral? Write your comments below.

Let Somersault (@smrsault) help you strategize your brand’s social media communication.

And be sure to bookmark and use daily the SomersaultNOW online dashboard.

The Associated Press is talking up a new “visual identity system,” to be rolled out over the coming months (a historical retrospective of AP logos is shown above with the new logo on the right).

The global news network says the look and logo are designed for the digital era and are supposed to unite its various offerings as part of a “master brand” strategy. AP called this the first significant change in its look in 30 years. The first use is on its new AP Mobile news app and AP.org website (@AP). According to its brand introduction (pdf) document, the new visual identity system brings to life the AP values of “integrity, action, and independence...and creates a distinct footprint in the media marketplace.”

AP President/CEO Tom Curley says in the announcement, “We have world-class content and world-class products and now we have the world-class look to go with them.”

The system expands the range of colors and designs available for use in AP products and services. The logomark recognizes the past stencil pattern while the logotype is black with a red underscore, both in a white box. This design is by the firm Objective Subject (@ob_sub), which says the red underscore, dubbed ‘the prompt,’ “evokes AP’s emphasis on editorial rigor and precise and accurate approach.” It goes on, “We retained the original logo’s stencil lettering, which embody the gutsy and adventurous personality of an international news organization.”

The Associated Press Stylebook (@APStylebook) is considered to set the standard in journalistic (and public relations) spelling and grammar.

Let Somersault (@smrsault) help you establish or update your logomark to convey your brand’s true identity.

Be sure to bookmark and use daily the SomersaultNOW online dashboard; especially the Religion News tab.

L2 Think Tank (@L2_ThinkTank) reports that, according to Union Square Ventures Partner Andy Weissman (@aweissman), we’re moving into “the ambient computer age,” where our connected devices are becoming smaller and more powerful. The implications of this changes our media habits, the way we socialize, and much more. In an attempt to quantify this impact, Weissman outlines the 8 places in our lives where mobile will have the biggest near-future impact on investment:

Reading – A new breed of mobile-primary reading formats are emerging that allow us to consumer and share media in new and different ways.

Social – Our always-on devices give us instant access to sharing at all times.

Payments – In Japan people are already paying for subway rides with their mobile devices. Before long we’ll be using what was formerly a voice device for transactions, and this trend is already well underway in the United States.

Learning – We can now absorb information from our mobile phones and use the classroom as a venue for discussion and collaboration.

Location-Based Innovation – One in 3 searches on mobile devices have local intent.

Media – Facebook holds the biggest archive of photos in the world. Media in the mobile world is fundamentally conversational.

Blurring – The smartphones we keep with us on our hip at all times create a blurring effect in the world of connectedness. We’re no longer just connected on our laptops, but wired-in everywhere.

Medicine – Today patients share data and information with doctors in real-time.

Read this in full.

Contact Somersault (@smrsault) to help you take advantage of mobile trends to advance your brand.

And be sure to bookmark and use daily the SomersaultNOW online dashboard.

Novelist Ann Patchett discusses on The Colbert Report the importance of brick-and-mortar bookstores and explains what prompted her to open Parnassus Books (@ParnassusBooks1) in Nashville.

O’Reilly Media’s Tools of Change for Publishing (@ToC) (#toccon) was held in New York City Feb. 13-15. It’s the annual conference for professionals to discuss where digital publishing is headed.

Some sessions are available to watch on video; for example Andrew Savikas (@andrewsavikas), CEO at Safari Books Online (@safaribooks) gave a presentation on the growth of subscription-based access to books online.

Also see O’Reilly’s TOC 2012 YouTube channel.

In “TOC 2012: LeVar Burton, Libraries and The Bookstore of the Future,” Publishers Weekly (@PublishersWkly) senior news editor Calvin Reid (@calreid) says,

Probably the most startling presentation of the day was “Kepler 2020,” a look at the efforts to transform the iconic independent bookstores into a new wave community owned bookstore that will embrace technology and a fairly breathtaking slate of new initiatives. Among them: split the store into for-profit sales and non-profit cultural foundation entities; diversify beyond the sale of print books to include services, subscriptions, memberships and corporate sponsorships, and aggressively adopt technology, including digital e-readers and e-books, perhaps even giveaway Kindles and Nooks!

Also see PW’s “TOC 2012: Executive Roundtable Debates the Way Ahead.”

Bob Young (@caretakerbob), founder and CEO of Lulu (@Luludotcom), spoke on “There Is No Such Thing As a Book, or Re-Thinking Publishing In The Age of the Internet.”

Other coverage can be seen at ePUBSecrets (@ePUBSecrets), “More ePUB Resources from Day 2 of TOC.”

Extensive TOC coverage is by Porter Anderson (@Porter_Anderson) in “Writing on the Ether.” Also see his comprehensive Twitter stream aggregation.

Joe Wikert (@jwikert), general manager, publisher & chair of TOC conference, has coverage.

And see American Libraries, the magazine of the American Library Association (@amlibraries), coverage “Tools of Change Conference, Day 1” and “Tools of Change Conference, Day 2”

Let Somersault (@smrsault) help you navigate the swirling changes taking place in the book publishing industry.

And stay current with news about the publishing world by bookmarking our SomersaultNOW online dashboard.

In time for the beginning of the centuries-old tradition of Lent on Ash Wednesday (Feb. 22), churches, bloggers, and others can now share the season’s official and coordinated Bible readings in a free PowerPoint® presentation consisting of vivid color photography of nature scenes combined with Scripture verses from the new bestselling Bible translation Common English Bible (http://CommonEnglishBible.com).

The presentation (http://CommonEnglishBible.com/CEB/LentDownloads and http://slideshare.com/CommonEnglishBible) is comprised of 9 Bible readings to observe Ash Wednesday, each Sunday of Lent, Good Friday, and Easter. It’s flexible enough to display only portions from it or all the slides, and to present them prior to or during church services, embed in blogs and other websites, or email to friends. Verses are selected from the Revised Common Lectionary (Year B).

“On the church liturgical calendar, Lent is the Christian season of preparation 40 days before Easter,” says Paul Franklin, PhD, associate publisher of the Common English Bible (Twitter @CommonEngBible – http://twitter.com/CommonEngBible). “This presentation beautifully helps church leaders and others guide viewers into scripture verses they can quickly comprehend in 21st century English so they can enjoy a time of personal reflection, prayer, and a change of heart and life.”

An example is from the readings for Ash Wednesday: “Purify me with hyssop and I will be clean; wash me and I will be whiter than snow. Let me hear joy and celebration again; let the bones you crushed rejoice once more. Hide your face from my sins; wipe away all my guilty deeds! Create a clean heart for me, God; put a new, faithful spirit deep inside me!” Psalm 51:7-10 (CEB).

In addition to the PowerPoint presentation, a Lenten blog tour is being planned and a Lenten Bible reading marathon is being coordinated with churches, schools, and civic organizations (to participate, email jpetersen@somersaultgroup.com).

Along with embedding the presentation, bloggers can also embed a new 60-second video (http://vimeo.com/CommonEnglishBible), showing how the Common English Bible is an uncommon translation that clearly communicates in today’s terms God’s message of love to everyone, no matter what age, gender, station in life, or other personal outlook.

The Common English Bible’s popularity has soared since it was first released last September. It’s a bestseller in Christian retail stores; people are printing its verses in calligraphy when they LIKE the Facebook page http://facebook.com/LiveTheBible; and churches are using it to read through the Bible in a year (e.g. http://www.fourthchurch.org/bibleyear.html).

The Common English Bible text, including the Apocrypha, is available to search for free online at Bible Gateway (http://www.biblegateway.com/versions/Common-English-Bible-CEB/), YouVersion.com, and the translation’s website.

The Common English Bible is a collaboration of 120 Bible scholars and editors, 77 reading group leaders, and more than 500 average readers from around the world. The translators – from 24 denominations in American, African, Asian, European, and Latino communities – represent such academic institutions as Asbury Theological Seminary, Azusa Pacific University, Bethel Seminary, Denver Seminary, Princeton Theological Seminary, Seattle Pacific University, Wheaton College, Yale University, and many others.

The Common English Bible is written in contemporary idiom at the same reading level as the newspaper USA TODAY—using language that’s comfortable and accessible for today’s English readers. More than half-a-million copies of the Bible are already in print, including an edition with the Apocrypha. The Common English Bible is available for purchase online and in 20 digital formats. A Reference Bible edition and a Daily Companion devotional edition are now also available. Additionally, in the coming year, Church/Pew Bibles, Gift and Award Bibles, Large Print Bibles, and Children’s Bible editions will be in stores, joining the existing Thinline Bibles, Compact Thin Bibles, and Pocket-Size Bibles, bringing the total variety of Common English Bible stock-keeping units (SKUs) to more than 40.

Visit CommonEnglishBible.com to see comparison translations, learn about the translators, get free downloads, and more.

The Common English Bible is sponsored by the Common English Bible Committee, an alliance of five publishers that serve the general market, as well as the Christian Church (Disciples of Christ) (Chalice Press), Presbyterian Church (USA) (Westminster John Knox Press), Episcopal Church (Church Publishing, Inc.), United Church of Christ (The Pilgrim Press), and The United Methodist Church (Abingdon Press).

For a media review copy of the Common English Bible and to schedule an interview with Paul Franklyn, please contact Audra Jennings, ajennings@tbbmedia.com at 1.800.927.1517.

How do people discover books in the digital age? Digital Book World (@DigiBookWorld) reports that, according to a survey presented at the Digital Book World conference (#dbw12) in New York last month, nearly half of readers discover new books through the recommendations of family and friends, and nearly a third discover them at bookstores.

·         49% - Family and friends’ recommendations

·         30% - Bookstore staff recommendations

·         24% - Online and print advertising

How will readers discover, buy, and read new books as e-reader and tablet ownership increase and traditional books sales channels are challenged?

See this article in full.

A new service that wants to help in this regard is Small Demons (@smalldemons). It takes all of the meaningful data from all favorite books and puts it in one place. Small Demons collects and catalogs the music, movies, people, and objects mentioned in books and makes those details searchable, creating a universe of book details, or as the service calls it, a storyverse.

Book Baby (@BookBaby) says Small Demons CEO Valla Vakili was so intrigued by the description of Marseilles in Jean-Claude Izzo’s Total Chaos that he replaced the Paris leg of his trip with Marseilles, an experience so inspiring that the concept of Small Demons was born.

In a recent interview with GalleyCat (@GalleyCat), Small Demons VP of content and community Richard Nash explained: “If you are an author, we are going to create verified author pages. You’re going to be able to add biographical information, information about your own books and other features. You will also get access to the editing tools that we are using to fix the computer’s mistakes. We know algorithms can’t get everything right and even when they get something right, they can’t necessarily provide the nuance that a human being can.”

Nash continued: “A computer can tell us how many times a song appears in a book. But it can’t tell us that it is the song that the couple dances to at the wedding reception or the song the jilted lover plays after being dumped. It can’t tell you the emotional resonance of it. So we are going to be relying on librarians and authors and gifted amateurs to come in and help us fix and add and weight and evaluate all the data we are generating. Individual authors will have that ability over an extended period of time.”

Read this in full.

Other services that aids in discovering new books are Rethink Books (@RethinkBooks) and its FirstChapters (@first_chapters) platform, and Findings (@findings), a tool for sharing clips while using Amazon Kindle.

Other articles about the challenge of finding books:

Enhanced Editions (@enhancededition), “On Book Discoverability, Discovery, and Good Marketing.”

Austin American Statesman (@statesman), “‘Discoverability’ key in publishing industry's transformation.”

AARdvark (@digitaar), “The Key to Saving Publishing and New Writers — Branding the Publisher to the Consumer.”

GalleyCat (@GalleyCat), “Amazon's Book Search Visualized: Check out this nifty, homemade book recommendation engine.”

The Digital Shift (@ShiftTheDigital), "Libraries Still an Important Discovery Source for Kids' Books, Says Study."

Also see our previous blogposts, “BookRiff (@BookRiff): A Marketplace for Curators” and "How Ebook Buyers Discover Books."

Along these same lines, you’ll want to read StumbleUpon’s (@PaidDiscovery) “Creating an Infectious Brand” and “Recapping the 5 Keys to Brand Discovery.”

Stay current with publishing news when you bookmark and use daily our (@smrsault) SomersaultNOW online dashboard., especially the Book Discovery Sites tab.