In The New York Times Media & Advertising section (@NYTimesAd), David Carr (@carr2n) says “the velocity of transformation is growing” in this digital publishing era.
Technology has altered the media business more than most, not in one big surge, but in a series of waves, each one shifting the ground that traditional businesses were built on.
He recounts how David Carey, the president of Hearst Magazines (@HearstCorp), had The Huffington Post (@HuffingtonPost) on his mind when he addressed a group of employees last week.
“I am telling them to beware of digital upstarts that don’t follow any of the rules of big companies like ours,” he said. “Huffington Post has gone down paths that others scoffed at and they have emerged with a string of very strong products.”
At a media event today in Los Angeles, Microsoft announced its new tablet, Surface (@surface) (#Surface), which, when it debuts (a release date was not announced) will feature a 10.6-inch wide display with Gorilla Glass, its own kickstand, Bluetooth, front & rear camera, a full-size USB port, dual Wi-Fi antennae, a multitouch full-size keyboard, a stylus which writes freehand on the screen, a trackpad, and presumably Microsoft Office software (Word, Excel, PowerPoint, etc.) — and yet is only about a half-inch thick. Models will come with either 64 gigabytes or 128 GB of storage.
Its capacity as an e-reading device was left unexplained. Microsoft has invested $300 million investment in Barnes & Noble's Nook e-reader, though B&N was not part of today’s announcement.
Publishers Weekly coverage of the just-concluded BEA (@BookExpoAmerica) includes the following: According to Bowker’s (@Bowker & @DiscoverBowker) newest figures of books produced, last year there were 211,269 self-published titles (based on ISBNs) released, up from 133,036 in 2010.
Vice president for Bowker Market Research Kelly Gallagher reports more statistics:
·The most popular genre in terms of units is fiction (45%), but nonfiction leads in sales (38%)
·The average price for a self-published fiction book is $6.94, while nonfiction titles command $19.32
·While ebooks accounted for 41% of self-published units, they only accounted for 11% of sales because the average self-published ebook sold for $3.18, while trade paperbacks had an average price of $12.68 and hardcovers averaged $14.40.
Gallagher also says Bowker is developing a self-publishing White Paper, and is creating a self-publishing bestsellers list.
In Bowker’s annual report on US print book publishing for 2011 (compiled from its Books In Print® database), preliminary figures from US publishers lead Bowker to estimate that traditional print book output grew 6% in 2011, from 328,259 titles in 2010 to a projected 347,178 in 2011 (that's 951 books published every day), driven almost exclusively by a strong self-publishing market. Bowker says this is the most significant expansion in more than 4 years for America’s traditional publishing sector; but removing self-publishing from the equation would show that the market is relatively flat from 2010.
“Transformation of our industry has brought on a time of rich innovation in the publishing models we now have today. What was once relegated to the outskirts of our industry — and even took on demeaning names like ‘vanity press’ — is now not only a viable alternative but what is driving the title growth of our industry today,” says Gallagher. “From that standpoint, self-publishing is a true legitimate power to be reckoned with. Coupled with the explosive growth of ebooks and digital content – these two forces are moving the industry in dramatic ways.”
Genres that contributed to the robust growth in the Traditional sector include:
·Education, with a hefty 20% increase
·Music (up 14%)
·Philosophy & Psychology (up 14%)
·Religion (up 12%)
·Juveniles (up 11%
·Biography (up 11%)
·Business (up 11%).
·Publishing mainstay Fiction – the largest genre – turned around a multi-year decline with a notable 13% increase.
And according to a report by the Association of American Publishers (@AmericanPublish), US publishers in the Trade sector saw significant sales increases worldwide in both print and e-format English-language books in 2011.
Contact Somersault (@smrsault) to help you manage your content creation.
Be sure to bookmark and use daily the SomersaultNOW online dashboard; especially the Publishers tab, which includes links to self-publishing publishers.
The act of reading a “tangible tome” has evolved, devolved, and changed many times over, especially in recent years. I hope for the film to stir thought and elicit discussion about the immersive reading experience and the lost craft of the book arts, from the people who are still passionate about reading on paper as well as those who are not.
Reporter Laura Hazard Owen (@laurahazardowen) writes in paidContent (@paidContent) that PwC expects total book spending in North America to remain relatively flat; “1.1% compound annual rate” of increase between 2011 and 2016.
PwC thinks that while total spending on print trade books will decline, the ebook market will be growing fast enough by 2013 to offset those declines. In the US, the company estimates that “around 30% of adults had at least one portable reading device [an e-reader or tablet] in the first quarter of 2012.”
By 2016, PwC expects, “ebooks will account for half of total spending on consumer books” in the US and the total US consumer book market (print + digital) will be worth $21 billion, up from $19.5 billion in 2011.
According to PwC’s blog, the E&M Outlook says 3 behavioral changes are driving global shifts in industry structure and value:
1.From print to digital: Electronic books’ share of total global spending on consumer and educational books will rise from 5% in 2011 to 18% by 2016.
2.From fixed to mobile consumption: Global mobile Internet access increased from 26% of total Internet access spending in 2007 to 40% in 2011 – and will grow to 46% by 2016.
3.From West to East, and North to South: Total revenue growth to 2016 in Central and Eastern Europe/Asia Pacific will be almost double that of North America/Western Europe. And growth in the southern Latin America/Middle East/Africa market will average more than twice that of North America/Europe by 2016.
In the video below, Marcel Fenez, Global Leader, Entertainment & Media at PwC, explains how PwC sees this time period as being “the end of the digital beginning.”
Contact Somersault (@smrsault) to help you take advantage of publishing’s digital growth for your content.
Jane Litte at Dear Author (@dearauthor) reports that Kobo is paying a 70% royalty on ebooks priced between $1.99 and $12.99, and a 45% royalty on ebooks below $1.99 or above $12.99. By contrast, Amazon pays a 70% royalty on KDP ebooks priced above $2.99 and a 35% royalty on those below $2.99. And she notes that authors can sell their books with or without DRM.
Mardel (@Mardel_Inc) retail chain has 35 stores in 7 states. Its store in Oklahoma City, OK is now “one of the first Christian bookstores that has a newly-installed Espresso Book Machine® (EBM), technology that offers patrons instant access to more than 8 million titles printed in any language, and allows area Oklahoma authors to self-publish their work on-site.”
“Now people have a source to print-on-demand all types of books in any language and genres, and to publish their own professional or personal writings,” said Kevin McDonell, merchandise manager of Mardel.
The EBM is “the only digital-to-print at retail solution on the market. With the push of a button, any book from EspressNet®, On Demand Books’ (@espressobook) digital catalog of content, can be printed, bound and trimmed, creating a paperback book that is virtually indistinguishable from the publisher’s version.“
Last November, Baker Publishing Group (@ReadBakerBooks) became the first major Christian publisher to make available almost its entire paperback list to the EBM network.
Zondervan (@Zondervan), the evangelical Christian publishing division of HarperCollins, has begun a new direct-to-digital imprint. Zondervan First (@ZondervanFirst) launches with the acquisition of a historical fiction title, Love in Three-Quarter Time by Dina Sleiman. The digital titles will be produced with editorial and marketing support from Zondervan.
Zondervan First will initially focus on fiction but will eventually include all the categories the company currently publishes. Submissions will be accepted for fiction, non-fiction, and Bible material suitable for kids, teens, and adults in addition to manuscripts geared for curriculum, church resources, academic, and reference books.
Zondervan First will not pay an advance, but authors will receive a 25% royalty from the first book sold. After an ebook sells 10,000 net copies, the author's royalty rate rises to 50%.
And Alive Communications literary agency for Christian and inspirational titles has launched “a sister epublishing company, Bondfire Books (@BondfireBooks).“
“We aim to be a game changer by working with other literary agencies and paying all authors a 50% net royalty, essentially double the industry standard of 25%. We will also offer 5-year renewable terms instead of the normal life of copyright,” says Rick Christian (@RicklyChristian), founder of Bondfire Books and Alive Communications.
The book trade's annual international convention, Book Expo America (BEA) (@BookExpoAmerica) (#bea12), is happening right now in New York at the same time the Electronics Entertainment Expo (@e3expo) (#E3) is underway in Los Angeles. Even though they’re occurring on extreme opposites of the continent, they may have more in common than you think.
E3 is where developers announce advanced technology in the computer and video game industry. That may sound like an entirely different world from literary interests, but in today’s digital publishing universe, technology in gaming is probably a short circuit away from being used in an ebook tablet!
If you’ve ever pondered the cryptic acronyms and abstruse language found in the arcane world of publishing, VP of sales at Weldon Owen (@WeldonOwen), Amy Kaneko (@amykaneko), strips away the conspiratorial subterfuge to enlighten the uninitiated. She does so by parsing an innocuous email message she innocently sent to a colleague one day:
Hi ________,
I heard from the account. They saw the ARC and think it could be part of a coop opportunity for an endcap or MOD. Not for POG or WIGIG. Or we could put in a dump. They still want to see the dummy though. Of course we have to watch out, these guys might screw up the laydown and of course there is always the chance that they'll come back in a gaylord, then we'll have to remainder. I checked the stock and found we're OS! I can't sell what I don't have!
