Digital Book World (@DigiBookWorld) reports on new research from Bowker (@Bowker & @DiscoverBowker) that says about 235,000 titles were self-published in the US in 2011; 87,000 of them were ebooks.
While most self-published titles are still print books (some 63%), the ebook category is growing faster. Ebook self-publishing production is up 129% since 2006, versus a gain of 33% for print over the same period.
A handful of larger players dominate the ebook self-publishing market, according to the report. Author Solutions (47,094 titles, now owned by Penguin) and Smashwords (40,608 titles) led the way but Lulu wasn’t far behind (38,005). Outside of these three and Amazon’s CreateSpace, which dominates the print side of self-publishing, no other company has more than 10% market-share.
Also, paidContent’s (@paidContent) coverage, “Bowker: Number of self-published books up 287% since 2006,” says “43% of all print books published in the US in 2011 were self-published.”
See our previous blogposts
· “The Golden Age of Self-Publishing is Driving Title Growth”
· “Ebooks Projected to Comprise 50% of US Trade Book Market By 2016”
· “Extensive New Study: The Rise of E-reading”
On a related note, IndieReader’s (@IndieReader) article, “Are Self-Pubbed Authors Killing the Publishing Industry?” by Melissa Foster (@Melissa_Foster) says, “Self-published authors have created a devaluing of the written word, and, some of them are scrambling to see how low they can go to get noticed.”
And now Publishers Weekly (@PublishersWkly) reports that Random House and Penquin are in merger talks.
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