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Seminary professor, theologian and bestselling Christian author Calvin A. Miller died Aug. 19 of complications following open heart surgery. He was 75.

A former Southern Baptist pastor and professor at Southwestern Baptist Theological Seminary in Fort Worth, Texas, Miller had served from 1999-2007 at Samford University's Beeson Divinity School, most recently as professor of preaching and pastoral ministry. He was the founding pastor (1966) of Westside Church (@WestsideOmaha), Omaha, NE.

The author of more than 40 books, including fiction, non-fiction, and poetry, he was described as a writer of love letters to the Lord. Among his work is The Singer Trilogy, published by InterVarsity Press (@ivpress), and his latest book, Letters to Heaven, published by Worthy Publishing (@WorthyPub).

Read the news story in full.

·         Dr. Calvin Miller tribute page by Westside Church.

·         Facebook page of Westside Church.

·         Facebook page of Calvin Miller.

·         In Memoriam by Ed Stetzer (@edstetzer).

Image: Book Genome Project

On Mashable (@mashable), technology journalist Peter Pachal (@petepachal) writes, “In a scientific first, Harvard University researches successfully transformed a 53,426-word book into DNA, the same substance that provides the genetic template for all living things. The achievement could eventually lead to the mass adoption of DNA as a long-term storage medium.”

Published Thursday in the journal Science, the experiment aimed to demonstrate the viability of storing large amounts of data on DNA molecules. Since the data is recorded on individual nucleobase pairs in the DNA strand (those adenine-guanine/cytosine-thymine pairs you may be straining to remember from high school biology), DNA can actually store more information per cubic millimeter than flash memory or even some experimental storage techs, IEEE Spectrum reports.

Read this in full.

Also see TechNewsWorld's (@technewsworld) "DNA Could Become the Next Big Data Warehouse."

Contact Somersault (@smrsault) to help you take advantage of right-now technology in the communication of your brand message and content.

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

The Guardian’s (@guardian) Style Guide (@guardianstyle) editor David Marsh (@davidrmarsh) has declared today to be International Apostrophe Day (#apostropheday).

For proper execution, see The Writing Kit’s tutorial, Using the Apostrophe, and the above poster (see it enlarged).

Read why the British bookstore chain Waterstone’s (@Waterstones) dropped its apostrophe earlier this year, then listen to two BBC commentators discuss its implications.

See The Apostrophe Protection Society and the blogs Apostrophe Abuse (@apostropheabuse) and Apostrophe Catastrophes.

For fun, see this apostrophe/comma Speed Bump comic by Dave Coverly. J

And remember that the popular Bible translation Common English Bible (@CommonEngBible) uses the apostrophe in its copious number of contractions (which are used where the text warrants an engaging conversational style, but not used in divine or poetic discourse).

Let Somersault’s (@smrsault) editorial expertise help you properly use apostrophes when communicating your brand’s message.

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

MediaPost’s (@MediaPost) MarketingDaily lists the top 10 designated market areas (DMA) in which adults who personally own an e-reader reside:

  1. San Francisco-Oakland-San Jose, CA

  2. Washington, DC (Hagerstown, MD)

  3. New York, NY

  4. Boise, ID

  5. Austin, TX

  6. San Diego, CA

  7. Seattle-Tacoma, WA

  8. Denver, CO

  9. Philadelphia, PA

10. Salt Lake City, UT

Source: GfK MRI’s (@GfKMRINews) 2011 Market-by-Market study

See the Market-by-Market List of 205 DMAs (pdf).

Contact Somersault (@smrsault) to help you publish and market your brand’s content in today’s digital publishing environment.

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

Since August 2008, the Digital Bookmobile (@DigiBookmobile) has traversed America coast-to-coast, allowing readers of all ages in over 400 venues to experience digital audiobook, ebook, music, and video downloads from their public library and immerse themselves in an interactive learning environment.

Housed inside a 74-foot, 18-wheel tractor-trailer, the Digital Bookmobile is hosted by individual libraries in support of their download services and operated by OverDrive, Inc. (@OverDriveInc) [OverDrive Digital Library Blog (@OverDriveLibs)].

The traveling community outreach exhibit is an updated version of traditional bookmobiles but is equipped with Internet-connected PCs, high-definition monitors, a sound system, and a variety of portable media players.

See the national tour calendar of venues.

Also see our blogposts tagged “Library.”

Contact Somersault (@smrsault) to help you digitally publish and market your brand’s content in ebook, pbook, and audiobook formats.

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

On the ECPA (@ecpa) website, David Kinnaman (@davidkinnaman), president of Barna Group (@barnagroup), says new research shows pastors love books. “One of the nation’s most loyal book-buying audiences, 92% of all pastors in the US say they buy at least one book every month, and they average 3.8 books per month. That’s anywhere from 12 to 46 books a year. Compare that to the total population, where only 29.3% of American adults buy more than 10 books in the course of a year.”

·         Pastors, as a group, purchase between 8 million and 13 million books every year.

·         Pastors influence others — their staffs, boards, and congregants — to buy books.

·         Many pastors say they want to support the business and ministry of Christian retailers. But this sentiment — particularly for bricks and mortar Christian retail — is changing with the generations. Younger pastors are leading the shift to online buying, with 57% of Buster pastors (ages 28-46) expressing a preference for online.

·         When a pastor selects a ministry-related book, the most important factor, by a wide margin, is the topic. 58% of pastors say topic is the most important factor, while only 15% give top priority to the author of the book. This is consistent across all generations and across all church sizes.

·         By a large margin, pastors in the US prefer to read books in hardcover (55%). Only 24% prefer paperback, and 16% prefer digital.

·         E-reading devices have tripled in their penetration among pastors in the last 2 years.

Read this in full.

Also see our previous blogpost, “Study: Christians are Embracing Tablets & E-readers” and other posts tagged research.

Contact Somersault (@smrsault) to help you reach pastors with your book and brand message.

And be sure to bookmark and use daily the SomersaultNOW online dashboard; especially the Research tab.

Moody Publishers (@MoodyBooks) author and long-time Moody Radio (@MoodyRadio) pastor C. Donald Cole (retired) met listeners on the air a couple times each week to answer their questions about the Bible and the Christian life. He died at the age of 89 Aug. 4 from complications due to Parkinson’s disease.

A public visitation will be held at Wheaton Bible Church (@wheatonbible) Friday, Aug. 31. Visitation will be from 11:30 am–1:30 pm and a public memorial service will be held from 2–3:30 pm. The burial will be private.

·         See Moody Radio’s tribute page and hear the memorial radio program hosted by Wayne Shepherd (@WayneShepherd)

·         Read a tribute by Moody Radio host Chris Fabry (@chrisfabry).

·         Listen to a tribute by Chris Fabry.

·         See the Don Cole memorial page on Facebook.

A consistent problem with promotional book readings and signings is that they're often barely attended. Now Publishers Weekly (@PublishersWkly) senior news editor Calvin Reid (@calreid) reports, “Science author Andrew Kessler is launching a new online venture called Togather.com (@TogatherInc), a ‘fansourcing’ platform that allows authors or their fans to propose an author event and get commitments from fans planning to attend well before the event is held.”

Much like a crowdfunding site like Kickstarter, Togather.com allows an author to know in advance whether there’s enough interest and support to hold an event at all.

Togather.com is free for authors. Writers establish an account that will allow them to plan events on a custom author event page that can be circulated through social media sites like Twitter and Facebook. “The event page allows authors to set up a tour, schedule events, tweak the details, and solicit support for the event before the author arrives,” Kessler said.

In a phone interview with PW, Kessler outlined how Togather works. Using the Togather account, an author can decide what kind of support he or she will require to actually hold the event — sell, say, 20 books, or get RSVPs from 60 people if it’s a school or free event, or sell tickets. Since one of the criteria for an event can be book sales, Togather is also organized to sell books. Fans can go to the page and propose additional events, and the author can review the proposal, accept it or ask for changes, or tweak the level of commitments.

The site lets authors notify their fans how many people it will take to reach a certain level of book sales (Kessler consulted with booksellers on this)....For book buys or other financial transactions, the site will take credit card numbers but not process the sale until the desired commitment level is achieved — if there’s not enough interest, the event is canceled and no one is charged....Kessler said, “[Togather] turns fans into your publicists.”

Read this in full.

Also see coverage by PaidContent, GalleyCat, and TNW.

Contact Somersault (@smrsault) to help you stay current with publishing and marketing opportunities for your brand.

And be sure to bookmark and use daily the SomersaultNOW online dashboard; especially the Book Discovery Sites tab.

Here’s a fun way to display the creative variety of typefaces. This Periodic Table of Typefaces by designer Cam Wilde shows the 100 most popular, influential, and notorious typefaces used throughout time. See it enlarged. A print copy is available.

Below is another version of it, promoting Just My Type, the book about “that pivotal moment when fonts left the world of Letraset and were loaded onto computers, and typefaces became something we realized we all have an opinion about.”

Also see our previous blogposts:

·         “Font Pain and Poetry: So Much Depends on a Curve”

·         “1912 Typeface Specimen Book Now Online”

·         “The Periodic Table of Storytelling”

·         “The Periodic Table of the Books of the Bible”

Contact Somersault (@smrsault) to help you publish and market your content with excellence.

And be sure to bookmark and use daily the SomersaultNOW online dashboard to see all things book-related; especially the Editing tab.

Publishers Weekly (@PublishersWkly) says, “In another sign that the industry is moving toward a hybrid market, fewer ebook buyers reported buying only digital titles this spring than a year ago.”

According to Book Industry Study Group’s (@BISG) newest edition of Consumer Attitudes Toward Ebook Reading report, the percentage of ebook consumers who exclusively or mostly purchase ebooks fell from nearly 70% in August 2011 to 60% in May 2012. Over the same period, the percentage of survey respondents who have no preference for either ebook or print formats, or who buy some genres in ebook format and others in print, rose from 25% percent to 34%.

Read this in full.

Read the news release.

See a copy of the core survey question set (pdf).

The following are slide presentations of this year's and last year's reports:

Also see our previous blogposts, “Even E-reader Owners Still Like Printed Books, Survey Finds,” “EPILOGUE: the future of print,” and others tagged “Ebook.”

Contact Somersault (@smrsault) to help you strategically publish and market your content in both ebook and pbook formats.

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