Entries tagged with “distribution” from Tools of Change for Publishing
Microsoft/O'Reilly Alliance Means DRM-free Ebooks Coming from MS Press
Andrew Savikas
September 24, 2009
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Full details are in Tim's post on the Radar blog (and in the Press Release and in the statement from Microsoft ), but thought one part of this deal worth calling out specifically here:
I'm particularly excited that as part of this agreement, Microsoft has committed to make its ebooks DRM-free and device-independent. One of our goals at O'Reilly has been to make sure that ebook customers can read them on any device, and have the ability to keep using them even if they change their preferred device. Having Microsoft Press join us in this commitment is a big step forward towards an open ebook market.
We begin transitioning distribution (including digital) in December, which means there will be lots to show and tell at February's TOC Conference.
iPhone App Outperforms Most Print (Computer) Books This Holiday Season
Andrew Savikas
January 7, 2009
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Conventional wisdom suggests that when choosing pilot projects, you pick ones with a high likelihood of success. It's hard to argue that iPhone: The Missing Manual was a reasonable choice for testing the iPhone App waters. But while we knew it would do well, we've been quite pleased with just how well:
- If the iPhone App by itself had been a book, it would be a top 10 seller in BookScan for Computer Books this holiday season, based on just 17 days of sales
- The print version appears to have been unaffected, retaining a solid position in the top 3 for Computer Books in BookScan
- A full 1/3 of those buying the app are outside the US, mostly in countries where the print book is not readily available
There are certainly some who don't care for the book-as-app approach, preferring the library model (where one app enables reading multiple titles). It's also clear there's substantial customer interest in both options, and we strongly believe that offering a variety of options and letting customers choose is the right approach. This is a time for experimentation, and we'll be doing quite a bit more of it (format, pricing, content) in the digital -- and especially mobile -- space in the coming months.
Newspapers Pursued New Tech with Wrong Intentions
Mac Slocum
January 6, 2009
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In a column at Slate, Jack Schafer says newspapers' overcommitment to form and content lock-in led to the industry missing Web opportunities:
From the beginning, newspapers sought to invent the Web in their own image by repurposing the copy, values, and temperament found in their ink-and-paper editions. Despite being early arrivals, despite having spent millions on manpower and hardware, despite all the animations, links, videos, databases, and other software tricks found on their sites, every newspaper Web site is instantly identifiable as a newspaper Web site. By succeeding, they failed to invent the Web.
Sulzberger: "Be of the Internet, Not on the Internet"
Peter Brantley
October 23, 2008
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Arthur Sulzberger Jr. indicates he is willing to consider radical change to continue the New York Times' relevance in the digital age. From News.com:
Sulzberger would brand this not as a crisis, but rather as change that requires adaptation. "It's important for traditional companies to adopt strategies that enable us to be of the Internet, not on the Internet," he said. "There must be an institutional commitment to engage in reinvention, especially as the information revolution picks up steam."
That's why, he said, the Times has undergone some digital initiatives unusual for the print media business. It launched bookmarking and sharing service TimesPeople earlier this year. Soon, it will launch TimesExtra, which integrates acquisition Blogrunner onto the publication's home page to provide related links from across the Web. And it has also announced an API for developers to work with one of its most popular online features, the "Most Emailed" list.
Q&A with Hadrien Gardeur, Co-Founder of Feedbooks
Mac Slocum
September 23, 2008
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Feedbooks is a Web-based service that converts, catalogs and distributes ebooks in a variety of formats. Co-founder Hadrien Gardeur discusses Feedbook's system and future services in the following Q&A.
How would you define your company? Is Feedbooks a distributor? A digitizing service? A social network? Something else?
Probably all three. We already distribute a massive number of ebooks and most of our users currently use Feedbooks to discover and download public domain or Creative Commons licensed ebooks. But we're also working on various tools for authors and small publishers to create ebooks. We'd like to turn our readers into potential authors, and create a service where new authors can distribute their creations to a large user base.
Who is your typical user?
Do we really have a typical user? We probably used to have typical users when we mostly provided ebooks for dedicated reading devices: heavy readers. But that's not the case anymore, now that we've extended the service to the iPhone, too.
Why did you start Feedbooks?
We've seen a lot of very exciting services for music and video these last few years and I really believe that there's a huge potential for ebooks too, thanks to E Ink-based devices and multi-purposes platforms such as the iPhone and Android. I love reading and I'd like to create a great service where anyone can discover new books, and where authors can easily connect with readers.
Your Web site lists support for the Kindle, the Sony Reader, the iRex iLiad, the Cybook Gen3, the iPhone and other smartphones. How are you able to support all of these devices?
We use an abstract representation, somehow similar to DTBook, to store all of our books. We can generate a file on the fly based on this representation. Adding new formats is fairly easy thanks to this technology. We were the first service to distribute books in EPUB for this reason.
Which ebook format is most popular with your users? Which e-reader is most popular?
EPUB and the iPhone are probably the most popular right now thanks to our seamless integration into Stanza. The most popular dedicated device is the Kindle.
Have established book publishers used your service to create ebook editions?
No, we're still working on those features. I expect major publishers to use XML+XSLT or Adobe InDesign rather than a dedicated service. We're creating our publishing feature with the end-user or small publishers in mind rather than major publishers.
Do you plan to sell ebooks?
We do. I believe that free content and user-generated content in general shouldn't be in a different environment than the rest of ebooks. It makes a lot more sense to have both in the same environment and create an optimal experience for the user.
When will sales begin?
No specific date yet, we'd rather focus on building a good service first and then add this component.
Print on demand (POD) services seem like a logical extension for Feedbooks. Is this something you're planing?
Sure, I consider POD as another potential format for our platform. It's a lot easier to turn an ebook into a POD book than the other way around.
The Feedbooks RSS tool appears to be targeted at Kindle users who want to receive updated news and information from RSS feeds. Do you anticipate other uses for this tool, such as a blog-to-book service?
It's not targeted at Kindle users only. I use it every day on a Sony Reader, and it's actually quite popular with the iPhone, too. I've been experimenting with blog-to-book, there's a lot of such "blooks" (blog+book, serialized novels using blogs) out there. I created a catalog entry for Stanza to test how the readers react to these serialized novels. Such a tool could probably be very interesting for publishers, too.
Feedbooks and Lexcycle, the company behind the Stanza e-reader, have a close working relationship. How did this come together?
Lexcycle launched the iPhone version of Stanza a few days before we decided to release the first version of our new API. Marc [Prud'hommeaux, principal developer at Lexcycle] contacted me: they were looking for content that could be directly integrated into Stanza's online catalog. We exchanged a lot of e-mails with various information, and did a lot of work together to make sure that this would work from day one. There's still a lot of new features that I'd like to introduce and we'll continue improving both the API and Stanza in the future, to create an optimal experience.
How are publishers and others using the Feedbooks API?
I would describe our API as read-mostly for the moment. It's mostly useful for reading systems such as Stanza. Once we turn it into something that's read/write, the situation will be quite different and I can imagine various innovative publishing techniques based on this.
What publishing techniques do you foresee?
Publishing should be more of a seamless experience. We already use a lot of publishing tools (blogs, social networks etc...) and we shouldn't have such a gap between these tools and ebooks.
What are the biggest issues with digital conversion?
There's a lot of formats, and you can expect standards such as EPUB to evolve in the near future. But I believe that the biggest issue for publishers is to find the right balance between what users are allowed to do and the ability to preserve the layout and design of a book. The holy grail for publishers is probably something as powerful as PDF, but reflowable. Ebooks allow users to customize a lot of things and preserving the design of a book shouldn't be at the cost of this flexibility.
Kindle vs Sony Reader: Battle of Distribution Channels
Mac Slocum
September 17, 2008
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The face-off between Amazon's Kindle and Sony's Reader is broadening beyond tech specs and ebook formats. Now it's a battle of distribution channels.
Sony started selling its PRS-505 e-reader and related accessories in Target stores earlier this week. Sony Readers are also available through Borders, Waterstone's, and Web retailers, including third-party sellers on Amazon.
Amazon's Kindle push is limited to one very large Web channel: Amazon. But will that be enough to seize the e-reader market? Joe Wikert recently touched on this topic:
... Amazon has an awareness problem. They might be thrilled with the device's sales rate up to now. It may have exceeded their greatest expectations. They apparently insist on capturing 100% of the revenue for it though, hence their direct-only sales model. Meanwhile, Sony is chipping away by embracing the EPub format and striking distribution deals with Borders and now Target.
The Web has a tendency to amplify messages beyond their natural boundaries, sometimes to the point where Web hits are incorrectly projected as surefire mainstream blockbusters -- be they devices or movies or anything else that generates ample Web interest. Amazon's reach and the Kindle's technology -- especially its wireless capabilities -- have painted the Kindle as the dominant device in Web circles. But hit products need to resonate with the millions of people who don't pour through RSS feeds on an hourly basis, and Sony knows a thing or two about nurturing the mass market. Assuming we eventually receive confirmed e-reader sales figures, it'll be interesting to see how Amazon's mix of online publicity and Amazon-only distribution stacks up against Sony's traditional approach.
Perseus Targets Small Publishers with Digital Services Suite
Mac Slocum
September 4, 2008
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Perseus Book Group's new Constellation service offers independent publishers a conduit to digital formats and platforms. From the New York Times:
The companies involved in the deal include Google, for its Google Book Search feature; Amazon, for its Kindle electronic reader; Sony, for its Sony Reader; Barnes & Noble, for its "See Inside" feature on its Web site; and Lightning Source, a print-on-demand company.
Publishers who use the new service can provide a single digital book file to Constellation and specify how they would like it to be used.
Ingram Digital, OverDrive, LibreDigital and the non-profit Caravan Project provide similar digital services, although the tools, formats and distribution channels vary across firms.
News Roundup: Amazon Acquires Shelfari, Hyper-Local Author Events, The Myth of the Level Digital Playing Field
Mac Slocum
August 29, 2008
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Amazon is turning its investment in Shelfari, a book-centric social network, into a full acquisition, reports the Seattle Post-Intelligencer. Financial details haven't been released, but Shelfari CEO Josh Hug confirmed the acquisition on Shelfari's blog:
We've got some big plans ahead. With more resources and Amazon's expertise in building a platform where people come to share ideas, there are a lot of new opportunities in the future that will benefit each of you. In the meantime, you'll continue to have access to the great community and tools that you've always known and used on the site. (Continue reading)
BookTour and IndieBound Make Author Events Hyper-Local
BookTour, which provides author-generated pages and a listing of author tour events, has integrated their database with IndieBound. This is an interesting model, which obviously could expand in its breadth. From the BookTour blog:
... the trouble is neighborhood bookstores are all different (that's what makes them great). That made it hard to dump all their data into our hoppers in one go ...
Now, throughout BookTour, events taking place at IndieBound-represented bookstores will be added automatically to our database. Equally important, on both author and venue pages, when an event is taking place at an IndieBound-repped store, you'll have the option to purchase the book directly from that store.
The Myth of the Level Digital Playing Field
In response to Kassia Krozser's post about authors and electronic publishing rights, Joe Wikert notes that the sources of digital content influence discoverability:
One of the myths of the e-publishing world is that all books are on a level playing field, so you'll sell just as many with publisher X as you will with publisher Y. This simply isn't true, at least not in most cases. This is very similar to the complicated world of Google search results. Just because you love chocolate and you launched a website all about chocolate doesn't mean you'll immediately climb to the top of the Google results for a search on "chocolate."
Commentary: Apple Could Own the Ebook Category
Mac Slocum
August 20, 2008
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A recent discussion on the Reading 2.0 list examined Amazon's place within the ebook universe and the threat Apple poses if it enters the same space. In the following excerpt, John Conley looks at the fundamental differences between Amazon and Apple:
The debate as to how successful Apple is in selling music through iTunes and its impact on the music industry provides insight into Steve Jobs' strategy. People speculate that iTunes is contributing significant incremental profits to Apple even though Jobs says that it is not. Since the total results as far as costs and sales are really buried in the detail none of us may ever really know.
What is going on is that Apple is determined not to make the mistakes they made when they first came out with the Apple I in the '70s. They are using Mac, iPod and now iPhone to incubate a user base that is growing at a remarkable rate. They own the mind share of the next generation of power users, which is this generation. I have five children, age 27 to 13. When the oldest went to college he went with a PC, as did the next child. That was before iPod. My third child will be a senior in college this year and has been a Mac user since 14. The 13 and 15 year old are Mac users. The two oldest, one who is a PhD candidate, have converted to Mac. As this generation ages to the point of conspicuous consumption they will be all Apple in their information needs. They look at my briefcase with its multiple chargers for numerous devices and laugh. They know that Apple will provide them with the ultimate device. They have a level of loyalty to Apple that speaks of the incredible consumer power that now exists with the brand.
Whatever the current functionality of any Apple device the user belief that the next generation of iPhone will continue to innovate and provide the functionality that this next generation of users will require is why the Kindle will never have the success required to make it the mainstream device for end users.
The law of numbers will apply here in that if you have the largest installed base and strong brand loyalty you will provide the most desirable sales channel for those companies that are looking to sell product. Consumer product companies may not like dealing with Wal-Mart because they set all of the rules, but they do it anyway because they are the most powerful channel. Amazon desires to be the Wal-Mart of Web distribution, but they have no value added other than price. Apple provides the connectivity, software, platforms, and most important, loyal customers. If and when they decide that ebooks are a viable driver or requirement to meet the needs to their tens of millions of incubated users they will dwarf the efforts of any other ebook service provider in the market and the publishers will readily come to them with content. (They will also not make the mistake of asking the publishers to provide the content in some proprietary format.)
Apple's profit model is dependent on selling hardware and software. They bring more value added to the equation then a company like Amazon who, is only a distributor and a technology wannabe. Hardware is not Amazon's core competency and they do not have the infrastructure or money to fight a technology war. In the end they will be happy to be a partner in distribution of ebooks to an Apple device that meets the needs of e-readers and without a doubt be more functional than any device that Amazon would attempt to market.
Distribution is what Amazon has as its core competency. The Kindle, like all of its predecessors, will not rise in success beyond the early adopters because Amazon does not own the brand loyalty within the consumer electronic market segment that is required to make the next big step in creating meaningful demand.
(Excerpt reprinted with John Conley's permission.)
Profile of Hay House: "An Attitude is Not a Business Plan"
Andrew Savikas
May 19, 2008
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A recent New York Times article on self-help publisher Hay House is a glimpse into the fascinating life of founder Louise Hay. Whether you believe she really cured her own cancer is up to you, but beyond the human interest part of the profile are some great insights about publishing, including the importance of keeping practical business concerns in mind:
But an attitude is not a business plan. Hay House was not, in the beginning, very well run. The employees were mainly “people I knew,” Hay says, “a friend, or somebody who turned up, or somebody who wanted to work for Louise Hay. ... Meanwhile, large trade publishers, like HarperSanFrancisco and Tarcher/Putnam, were seeing the potential in New Age and investing heavily. Hay House would have failed quickly, or been bought out, but for the vision of Reid Tracy, who joined the company as an accountant in 1988 and became president in 1998. He invested his own money, too, and now owns 35 percent of the company; he is the sole shareholder besides Louise Hay herself, and everybody at Hay House, including its founder, considers Tracy the true leader.
That itself isn't terribly novel. But Reid Tracy's recognition that for authors (and savvy publishers) books are often just a means of enhancing their reputation in order to sell speaking engagements and ancillary products presaged the current buzz around using free content as a promotional tool:
[Tracy] realized more than 10 years ago that much of the money in New Age was to be made in items other than books: in card decks, audio tapes and page-a-day calendars. Major authors like Wayne Dyer and Marianne Williamson, who first came to Hay House just for ancillary products, later abandoned big trade houses to also do their books with Hay House.
And while the content Hay House published arguably couldn't be farther from what we publish, O'Reilly editor Andy Oram (who shared the original article link) pointed out some notable parallels to our eponymous brand:
- They realized that their authors had many channels for making sales besides conventional books, and they use all these channels to bolster one other.
- They recognize that their authors' work complements each other, and bring their authors together in group seminars.
- They play up the celebrity of their founder, who tends to choose trusted people based on intuition.
- They have a brand that goes far beyond the significance of any single offering, and fans accept what they think up next while staying true to the brand.
- They tend to follow their star authors wherever they take their ideas, and trust them.
- They're very self-consciously branching out into specialized products that also hold interest for children.
The Digital-Only Sequel
Mac Slocum
April 7, 2008
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A sequel to a successful film soundtrack isn't a new idea, but the team behind "Juno" is tweaking the concept: the film's second soundtrack -- "Juno B-Sides" -- will only be released in digital format.It's an interesting move: ride a wave of popularity in a low-risk digital format. If the album doesn't sell, the backers don't have to deal with a warehouse full of "Juno B-Sides" CDs/coasters.
In a roundabout way, a digital-only release is a hybrid concept that plugs into the efficiencies of a long-tail mindset and the Web 2.0 beta ethos. Basically: the low cost of digital distribution gives companies the confidence to release an ancillary product (or any product, for that matter).
If you extend this thinking to book publishing, digital-only releases could be the domain of updated book chapters, fan fiction or "inspired-by" material, and editor's picks that relate to a book's core themes. It could also be a test-bed for weird or esoteric products (i.e. is there a market for "Juno in Esperanto"? Probably not ... but you get the idea).
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