somersault

It turns out you can do more with a printed book than read it (ebooks eat your heart out). My Modern Net (@mymodernmet) features Brian Dettmer who uses knives, tweezers, and surgical tools to carve one page at a time and create stunning works of art. Nothing inside the out-of-date encyclopedias, medical journals, illustration books, or dictionaries is relocated or implanted, only removed.

Dettmer manipulates the pages and spines to form the shape of his sculptures. He also folds, bends, rolls, and stacks multiple books to create completely original sculptural forms. A totally different approach to editing a book!

See the amazing photos.

Danny Sullivan (@dannysullivan), editor-in-chief of Search Engine Land (@sengineland), has designed this helpful Infographic (#Infographic) “to visually present the major factors, the biggest and most important things that can help you in gaining [website] traffic from search engines.” As a content creator (publisher, agent, organization, author), you’ll want to print it and either keep it handy at your desk or give it to your IT department. Search Engine Optimization is an important component of strategic Social Media Marketing, a specialty of Somersault.

See the chart.

Another SEO-related new announcement you’ll want to read is MarketingVOX's (@marketingvox) “Google, Bing Take on Open Graph with Schema.org.”

As well as Econsultancy's (@Econsultancy) "SEO 'must-do' tips for SMEs: the experts' view."

This month is set aside by the Audio Publishers Association (APA) (@AudioPub) to celebrate the important role audiobooks play in a person’s literary life and to mark the overall growth of audiobooks in the market (last year downloaded audiobooks sales rose by 39% to $82 million vs. $59 million in 2009, while physical audiobooks fell 6%, at $137 million for 2010 vs. $146 million for the previous year).

APA has compiled some facts to honor the occasion:

• 25% of Americans have listened to an audiobook in the last year.
• Audiobook listeners are avid readers who use audiobooks as a way of enjoying an author's work when they’re not able to read. 94% of audiobook listeners have read a book in the past year vs. 70% of non-audiobook listeners.
• Many authors love audiobooks. Scott Turow, Janet Evanovich, Judy Blume, Barbara Taylor Bradford, Tom Wolfe, Lisa Scottoline — all listen to audiobooks.
• Most listeners use audiobooks in the car (whether they’re commuting or on driving vacations), but an increasing number of people also report using audiobooks while they’re exercising, cooking, gardening — and even at work.
• The average audiobook listener spends about 5 hours a week listening.
• Audiobooks are great for family listening on the road this summer — nothing ends the "are we there yet blues!" like a great audiobook. Audiobooks keep everyone in the car entertained while also increasing literacy skills; families can even knock out a few of the titles on a kid's summer reading list on the way to vacation.
• Audiobooks are a great tool for building literacy. Teachers and librarians report that listening to audiobooks helps children build better vocabularies and also helps them to read with better expression.

NPR’s Talk of the Nation (@totn) recently featured an interview about audiobooks. Listen to “Audio Book Sales Climb In Spite Of Competition.”

If you love audiobooks, you should read AudioFile magazine (@AudioFileMag). And for your convenience, here’s a Google search on the word “audiobooks.” Let Somersault help you publish audiobooks.

An article at UsTelevision (@goustelevision) displays logo art you’ve never seen before in one place. Viewing all 9,000 TV channel logos may help you break through your own creative block in designing that new logo you need for you or your client!

In under 3 minutes, Derek Sivers (@sivers) dissects lessons from a candid video and explains how leaders (and followers) start movements:

• A leader needs the guts to stand out and be ridiculed.
• The first follower shows everyone else how to follow.
• The leader embraces the first follower as an equal (so now it’s not about the leader (singular) any more, it’s about “them.”
• The first follower is an underestimated form of leadership.
• The first follower is what transforms a lone nut into a leader.
• When the second follower joins, it’s no long 2 but 3, and 3 is “news;” a movement must be public.
• New followers emulate the followers, not the leader.
• As more people join, momentum begins, until a tipping point occurs and a movement starts.
• As more people join in, it becomes less risky for others to join in (they won’t stand out, they won’t be ridiculed, but they’ll be part of the in-crowd if they hurry).

This is a great video to show at your next staff meeting!

Business Insider (@alleyinsider) highlights charts from a 115-page report on the state of the tablet market by Jefferies analyst Peter Misek. “The tablet industry is set to explode this year and next, becoming a worldwide phenomenon. He expects Apple and the iPad to be the biggest winner, but Samsung is looking like the strongest no. 2 right now.”

Compare book reading with other media consumption on tablets vs. computers:

See the charts.

Also see Marketing Charts (@marketingcharts) “Tablet Users Buy/Browse Online More than Smartphone Users.”

And MobileBeat’s (@VentureBeat) “New York Public Library brings history to your fingertips with Biblion for iPad.”

The New York Times article, “Retailers Offer Apps With a Catalog Feel” tells how new apps are turning tablets into digital catalogs.

Are you publishing content for the tablet market? Let Somersault help.

Shelf Awareness (@ShelfAwareness) reports that attendance at BookExpo America (@BookExpoAmerica) (#BEA, #BEA11, #BookExpo) last week, including Blog World Expo NY (@blogworld) (#BWENY), was 23,067.

Excluding BlogWorld, whose participants were not included in last year's attendance figures, attendance was 21,664, down just 255, or 1.2%, from 21,919 in 2010. BEA emphasized that this year’s slightly lower number reflected higher standards: the show “strategically vetted more attendee groups to improve the quality of those participating in BEA.” One resulting major change: there were 500 fewer attendee authors this year, authors distinct from those appearing for signings, panels and other events.

Also in Shelf Awareness, Ron Hogan (@ronhogan) recaps the Book Blogger Convention (@bookbloggercon) (#BookBloggerCon) where a blogger speaker is quoted saying: “authenticity, consistency, and generosity [are] crucial to any successful blog.”

More BBC recaps at The Reading Ape (@readingape), write meg! (@writemeg), and As I Turn the Pages (@bookangel224).

And watch the Book Business video "Voices From BookExpo America 2011."

According to Amazon.com’s (@amazon) list of the Top 20 Most Well-Read Cities in America, Cambridge, MA is at the top for the most books, magazines, and newspapers purchased per capita of any city in the United States. After compiling reading material sales data in both print and Kindle (@AmazonKindle) format since Jan. 1, 2011, on a per capita basis in cities with more than 100,000 residents, the cities are:

1. Cambridge, MA                11. Knoxville, TN

2. Alexandria, VA                 12. Orlando, FL

3. Berkeley, CA                    13. Pittsburgh, PA

4. Ann Arbor, MI                    14. Washington, DC

5. Boulder, CO                      15. Bellevue, WA

6. Miami, FL                          16. Columbia, SC

7. Salt Lake City, UT             17. St. Louis, MO

8. Gainesville, FL                  18. Cincinnati, OH

9. Seattle, WA                       19. Portland, OR

10. Arlington, VA                    20. Atlanta, GA

Read the news release in full.

The Religious Booksellers Trade Exhibit (RBTE) will be held next Tuesday through Friday at Pheasant Run Resort and Convention Center in St. Charles, IL. Publishers Weekly (@PublishersWkly) explains what it’s all about:

Back when independent bookstores dotted the landscape like churches, religion publishers represented only a fraction of the overall number at ABA's annual trade show. Apart from a few large trade houses that published the occasional book in the category, publishers whose focus was religion had other avenues to reach their audience. Their primary sales channels were not trade bookstores but denominational or larger chain religion outlets or independent evangelical Christian stores....

Then, in the early to mid-1990s, America's interest in religion mushroomed, and religion publishers responded with books that ranged over diverse topics, from angels and pyramids to the debates between religion and science, new archeological discoveries, interreligious dialogue, critical readings of sacred texts, and the recovery of ancient religious traditions—not to mention faith-based fiction.

Burgeoning reader interest coincided with the rise of the chain bookstores that pushed many independents out of business, and religion publishers began to see what had by then become BEA as a way to reach a wider audience by expanding their sales and marketing channels to include general trade and chain bookstores, using the show to gain exposure and publicity as they moved into the retail mainstream.

Read this article in full.

UPDATE: See exhibit wrap-up coverage by Publishers Weekly, "Smaller Liturgical Booksellers Trade Show Hits 20 Years."

One of the featured titles at this year’s RBTE is the Common English Bible (@CommonEngBible & @VersesForToday), the newest translation by the largest number of biblical scholars & church leaders in words 21st century readers use every day, balancing academic rigor with modern understandability, proven through extensive field-testing with, and acting on feedback from, hundreds of readers. It’s the only Bible to include National Geographic maps and to extensively use contractions where the text warrants an engaging conversational style (not used in divine or poetic discourse). This translation is necessary to clearly communicate God’s Word because 9,000 new words & meaning revisions are added yearly to the English lexicon. Professional communicators (preachers, professors, speakers, leaders, etc.) who use this authoritative translation (not a paraphrase) will be great communicators, effectively reaching their audiences with biblical text their audiences readily understand because the text is written the way they naturally talk.

See the website for more information.

According to Wired (@wired), Make Your Franklin (@MakeFranklin) is an online project asking artists and designers to put their own creative stamp on the very staid and familiar $100 bill. Yes, that’s still Ben Franklin above, but he’s been given a postmodern makeover. Interesting how new design elements jazz up products that have become commonplace. Something to consider in the publishing world!

Read the Wired article.