uPublishU – an all-day session at BookExpo America dedicated to independent authors – opened with a panel of book business leaders offering authors their insights on what it takes to succeed.

“It’s never been about self-publishing, or traditional publishing, or legacy publishing. It really is about just different ways that people can tell their stories,” noted Jon P. Fine, Director of Author and Publisher Relations for Amazon.com. “And in that sense, the growth of self-publishing as a legitimate venue can’t be overestimated. everybody can be an author, and that’s amazing. Particularly from my background as a First Amendment lawyer, the idea that anybody can tell their story is just an awesome fact.”

As CCC’s Chris Kenneally, the panel moderator, pointed out, self-publishing is one of the fastest-growing sectors in the publishing industry with 211,000 self-published titles, based on ISBNs, released in 2011, up more than 60 percent from 133,000 in 2010. Those numbers are driving literary agencies to offer authors a range of e-book publishing services.

“At Trident, we have a dedicated e-book division. ppeople working in that group are not traditional publishing people, because we didn’t want any of the traditional publishing baggage to be brought into that area.  We wanted people who were forward thinking, innovative, and open to new ideas,” said Robert Gottlieb, Founder & Chairman, Trident Media Group Agency.

“I want authors to think of themselves as a business, as a brand, and to think beyond your first book.  Part of your job is creating amazing works — writing beautiful books, writing informative books.  And the second part of your career is marketing those books,” explained Cindy Ratzlaff, President, Brand New Brand You Inc. “Every single thing you write in social media ends up being a piece of data that leads back to the brand of you.”

On the stand, says Andrew Albanese, Publishers Weekly senior writer, Cue declared that he did not know publishers were sharing information about the various deals among themselves. Whether or not there were a “conspiracy,” Cue claimed he knew nothing about it, Albanese tells CCC’s Chris Kenneally.

Reprising his extensive reporting for PW on the case, Albanese detailed who showed up in court this week (HarperCollins CEO Brian Murray), and who did not (Random House COO Madeleine McIntosh). Albanese notes, too, that in-court testimony ultimately may not count with Judge Denise Cote as much as evidence in the form e-mails and voice mail recordings.

Every Friday, CCC’s “Beyond the Book” speaks with the editors and reporters of “Publishers Weekly” for an early look at the news that publishers, editors, authors, agents and librarians will be talking about when they return to work on Monday.

Today’s readers – students especially – have high expectations of e-books and other digital media. Ever-evolving technology for tablets and e-readers makes the race to keep up a daunting one for publishers and authors. The leap from printed page to pixel-ed screen demands new strategies for content development.

“We need to learn more about how students are learning, and how they’re interacting with various kinds of content,” explains Michael Greer, Senior Development Editor, English, for Pearson Education, who spoke with CCC’s Chris Kenneally last fall at the PubWest 2012 conference in Keystone, Colorado .

“One of the mantras that I preach is to learn as much as you can about your user – always start with users, understand their needs, and understand how they’re engaging with your content,” Greer added. “It’s no longer enough simply to output an ePub file; people expect a different kind of experience when they’re on a mobile device. Whether that’s a phone or an iPad, it’s not just the experience of straight text. People want to learn and engage with content in a variety of different kinds of ways.”

In 2010, also at the annual PubWest conference, Greer discussed “Usability Studies in Textbook Design.” Collaborating with Prof. Tharon Howard of Clemson University, Greer had contributed to the then-recently-published collection, Usability of Complex Information Systems, Evaluation of User Interaction. That account of textbook usability studies with contemporary college students revealed, he said, that “the conventions that teachers are familiar with are not familiar to students.”

“His testimony had all the thrills you might expect from watching one lawyer depose another lawyer,” Albanese tells CCC’s Chris Kenneally. “Saul was tedious, and if not evasive, then clearly reluctant. He relied heavily on ‘can you repeat the question?’”

Ahead of the American Library Association annual meeting in Chicago – one of the book world’s top drawers – Albanese previews an interview with Robert Spoo, Chapman Distinguished Chair at the University of Tulsa College of Law, whose latest book, Without Copyrights, details a country where copyright piracy ruled – the US in the late 19^th century.

“At that time, U.S. copyrights did not extend to foreign authors,” Albanese explains. “Thus, the modern American publishing industry was built on, well, piracy! Only it wasn’t truly piracy—because the publishers were free under the law to take foreign works and reprint them without paying the authors royalties. But it certainly did chafe with the popular writers of the day, including Charles Dickens, Sir Walter Scott, Elizabeth Barrett Browning, and George Eliot, to name just a few.”

Every Friday, CCC’s “Beyond the Book” speaks with the editors and reporters of “Publishers Weekly” for an early look at the news that publishers, editors, authors, agents and librarians will be talking about when they return to work on Monday.

But a leading developer of mobile apps and related technology solutions for publishers sees a way to make peace with the many mobile wars. The trick, says Amphetamobile founder and CEO SiNae Pitts, is to pick your battles.

“There are many mobile wars,” Pitts explains for CCC’s Chris Kenneally. “There had been a lot of talk in the early days of whether publishers should develop native applications or should they be making mobile websites? And we’ve always taken the position that it’s never an either or – it always depends on the use case. With mobile-friendly websites, certainly there is a use case for creating a landing page and presenting information.” On the other hand, she adds, “native apps give a richer experience and enable people to take that content that you’re presenting and make it deeper into their workflow.

Ahead of the 35^th  SSP annual meeting in San Francisco, opening on Wednesday, Pitts noted that for many medical and research publishers Apple has won the platform contest – for now.

In that publishing niche, Pitts says, “iOS continues to dominate in terms of the devices installed, and the devices that people use, in hospitals or in the research setting.  So the approach is to lead with an iOS app to make the best experience for the majority of the users.  And given sufficient interest, depending on their population, to then build an Android app.”

Given that the US Department of Justice e-book price-fixing case begins this Monday, what Macmillan CEO John Sargent could and could not say at the ABA Plenary: “Publishing, Bookselling, and the Whole Damn Thing” was probably determined by company lawyers. All the same, Sargent — who is a potential witness in the case, though his firm has settled with the government – remained characteristically candid with outgoing American Booksellers Association president Becky Anderson, co-owner of Anderson’s Bookshops in Naperville, Illinois.

“Sargent called the DoJ action ‘extraordinarily myopic,” and he said [the feds had] ‘carried the water for Amazon, when it had 92% of the market,’” according to Andrew Albanese, Publishers Weekly senior writer. He tells CCC’s Chris Kenneally that Sargent “even added that the senior guys, including Eric Holder, are ‘just incompetent,’ for which he received resounding applause. And despite some goading, he didn’t say anything negative about Amazon.”

Every Friday, CCC’s “Beyond the Book” speaks with the editors and reporters of “Publishers Weekly” for an early look at the news that publishers, editors, authors, agents and librarians will be talking about when they return to work on Monday.

At BookExpo America later this week, Skott Klebe, CCC’s product evangelist, joins a panel on Taking Your Backlist Digital: Who Controls The Rights?, with CCC’s Michael Healy as moderator. “‘If you do a little math, you’ll see that we are now in that 35th year,” Klebe notes. “This termination rights facility may motivate authors to pull rights back and to bring the digital edition of older works back to market.”

Indeed, the digital transformation offers an unprecedented chance to breathe new life into midlist titles—as long as you hold the rights to do so. Are decades-old contracts the final word? The BEA panel with Klebe and Healy will discuss ways the pendulum may swing back to authors, in part as a result of these so-called “termination rights.”

“The costs to produce a nice digital edition like we’re accustomed to reading – those don’t just go away by wishing them.  Publishers can’t necessarily afford to turn every title that’s ever been published into a digital edition.  Things could languish in the backlist – out of print, out of digital availability – because nobody can afford to bring them to market,” Klebe explains for CCC’s Chris Kenneally.

The panel gets underway on Thursday, May 30, at 2:30 p.m., in Room 1E08 at the Javits Center, New York City. Also appearing are Devereux Chatillon, Transactional and IP Attorney; Jan F. Constantine, General Counsel for the Authors Guild; and Jennifer Weltz, Vice President, Jean V. Naggar Literary Agency, Inc. (JVNLA).

“The deal is substantially similar to other publisher settlements, except for the hefty price tag. Penguin is paying more than three times what Macmillan had paid, and more than Hachette, Simon and Schuster and HarperCollins paid in their initial settlement combined,” reports Andrew Albanese, senior writer at Publishers Weekly. “They almost certainly paid a premium for having to negotiate a late exit before trial.”

In related court filings, Justice lays out its case against Apple, alleging that the technology titan, was “ringleader” of a horizontal conspiracy to eliminate retail price competition from the e-book market.  Albanese tells CCC’s Chris Kenneally that Apple faces charges that it “exploited the publishers’ fears of an Amazon planet to push them—and only in a matter of weeks – into a one-time-only, take-it-or-leave- it deal that seemed too good to pass up.”

Every Friday, CCC’s “Beyond the Book” speaks with the editors and reporters of “Publishers Weekly” for an early look at the news that publishers, editors, authors, agents and librarians will be talking about when they return to work on Monday.

Most recently, Rob Johnson served as Head of Research Operations at the University of Nottingham, with responsibility for financial and administrative oversight of the University’s £400m portfolio of research projects.  The University of Nottingham is a longstanding advocate of open access publishing within the UK, and was one of the first UK universities to adopt an intermediary for handling Article Processing Charges (APCs).

To learn more about Copyright Clearance Center and its RighsLink comprehensive solutions for Open Access publishing, go to www.copyright.com/openaccess

“E-books in 2012 accounted for over $3 billion is sales, with a slew of new ventures and and innovative devices coming to market,” notes Andrew Albanese, Publishers Weekly senior writer. “However, a lot is being made about that 42% figure because it is the slowest growth ever for e-books,” he tells CCC’s Chris Kenneally. “But that’s only because we’re talking about real money now. When we used to see triple digit growth for e-books, the sums were small.”

Every Friday, CCC’s “Beyond the Book” speaks with the editors and reporters of “Publishers Weekly” for an early look at the news that publishers, editors, authors, agents and librarians will be talking about when they return to work on Monday.

For a preview, Steven Rosato, BEA Event Director, tells CCC’s Chris Kenneally about what’s new for this year – notably, a new “date pattern” (Thursday through Saturday), and “BEA Selects,” featuring presentations by independent publishers.

Wait a minute, one more thing. Parties. Ah yes, the parties! Rosato also makes special note of several book-related bashes at BEA itself, including the “Digital Cocktails Networking Happy Hour” (Thursday, May 30, 4:00 p.m. in the Digital Discovery Zone (D2Z), sponsored by IDPF ; and the BEA Bloggers Conference Networking & Happy Hour (Wednesday May 29, 4:30 p.m.) Networking Happy Hour.

For all the very latest on BEA, check out The Bean, Rosato’s BEA-centric blog.

Indeed, driven by advancements in technology and distribution, audiobooks are surging. According to the Audio Publishers Association, reports Andrew Albanese, Publishers Weekly senior writer, audiobook production rose in 2012 17% over 2011, and has jumped 57% since 2009.

“Freed from the need to buy CDs or tapes, the audiobook is perhaps the most convenient option out there—you can listen to an audiobook on any number of devices easily,” Albanese tells CCC’s Chris Kenneally. “For publishers, they are simply easier to market because they are downloadable and don’t need to find physical shelf space.”

Every Friday, CCC’s “Beyond the Book” speaks with the editors and reporters of “Publishers Weekly” for an early look at the news that publishers, editors, authors, agents and librarians will be talking about when they return to work on Monday.

At last week’s Digital Hollywood in Los Angeles, a panel of experts explored the issues that bring “Copyright, Content & Congress” together. Earlier this year, U.S. Representative Judy Chu (representing California’s 27^th District), co-founded the Creative Rights Caucus on Capitol Hill; as Amelia Wang, the congresswoman’s Chief of Staff, explained for CCC’s Chris Kenneally, copyright concerns have risen in recognition of the impact on the Golden State’s economy.

“Protecting creators’ rights is in the best interest of everyone. It’s of upmost importance. It drives American ingenuity and creates jobs,” Wang said. “The congresswoman also sees an opportunity to stress that individual creators are where innovation begins.”

When it comes to creativity, P.J. Kuyper, CEO of the Los Angeles-based Motion Picture Licensing Corporation (MPLC) reminded the audience that copyright is directly tied to their compensation as artists. “You have the right to control the duplication of your work.  You have the right to control the transmission or the retransmission of your work.  And you have the right to control the public exhibition,” said Kuyper. “Without those three rights, there is no way to make money on your creative work.  That means there is no home entertainment market. There’s no television market. There’s no streaming market. And there’s no cinema or theatrical market.”

Also joining the panel were Rob H. Aft, President of Compliance Consulting LLC, a Los Angeles-based media finance and distribution consultancy currently serving a variety of clients including banks, law firms, producers, distributors, directors and talent guilds in the U.S., Europe, Asia, Latin America and Africa; and Maura Kawai, Senior International Trade Specialist with the U.S. Department of Commerce’s export promotion arm, the U.S. Commercial Service, in Los Angeles West for the electronic media, IT and telecom, entertainment and education sectors.

Coming to New York City later this month, Reaching Readers is a conference devoted to book marketing that promises attendees they’ll learn in-depth about the trends, tools, and strategies necessary to succeed in today’s complex media landscape. Hannah Johnson, deputy publisher of the online trade magazine Publishing Perspectives, which is presenting the conference, joins CCC’s Chris Kenneally with a preview.

“Publishers are shifting their thinking from B2B to B2C and that’s not an easy shift to make,” Johnson notes  “A lot of the structures that are in place were built during the B2B era, and even to change those around is really complicated. We’ve tried to put together a program that highlights people who are innovating and thinking about new ways to market books. We’ve got speakers from publishing, and people outside of publishing, to bring in new perspectives.”

For the panel, Marketing In Verticals: No Re-Org Required, moderator Pete McCarthy, founder of McCarthy Digital, expects a discussion with bites – and bite.

“You can’t, in my humble estimation as a digital marketer, really understand consumers today without employing sophisticated technology, and you can employ it in a lot of different ways,” he tells Kenneally. “You can do the big data thing, which is analyze how everything is being consumed, looking at everything from marketing attribution, what’s working, what’s converting.  Or you can take a more tactical approach, which may work for a smaller publisher.

“You can have large, scaled systems that provide business intelligence and marketing dashboards and really pulling levers and understanding demographics and regionality and marketing accordingly,” says McCarthy. “Or, you can just have really smart marketers on the line. It’s everything from massive and scaled right down to small, targeted, and using publicly-available tools.”

“Boris Kachka’s Hot House tells the story of Roger Straus, legendary publisher at Farrar, Straus and Giroux. Everything told me that this book couldn’t work when I first spoke to Boris about it at the 2011 Frankfurt Book Fair,” he says. “At best, it would make a sleepy little book, I thought – too insider. Who cares about book publishing, right ? But the books is dishy, yet expertly researched, and beautifully written. It rises to the level of a great cultural history.”

Earlier this week, Albanese also notes, Hachette announced it would once again make its catalog of e-books available for sale to libraries. “I think the bigger news is that there is now robust competition for e-book lending services,” he says. “Competition can only benefit the library e-book market.”

Every Friday, CCC’s “Beyond the Book” speaks with the editors and reporters of “Publishers Weekly” for an early look at the news that publishers, editors, authors, agents and librarians will be talking about when they return to work on Monday.

Recorded Friday, April 26, 2013, “Beyond the Click: There’s More to Publishing Than Uploading a File” featured Matthew Cavnar, Vice President of Business Development at Vook; Allen Lau, co-founder and CEO of Wattpad, the world’s largest community of readers and writers; Dori Jones Yang author of five books, including the historical novels Daughter of Xanadu and Son of Venice, set in China at the time of Marco Polo; and Curt Matthews, CEO, Chicago Review Press, Inc., and Independent Publishers Group.

“Is the book endangered? That’s up for debate, I think. The book is changing, for sure. And certainly, reading is under pressure,” Andrew Albanese, PW’s senior writer, tells CCC’s Chris Kenneally. “But I think Patterson is to be commended for stirring the pot, because I would like to see more voices in the discussion.”

Albanese also reveals the winner of PW’s Bookstore of the Year Award – Square Books of Oxford, Miss., the center of the fictional Yoknapatawpha County in William Faulkner’s novels. Founded by Richard and Lisa Howorth in 1979, the store has grown into a trio of storefronts over the past three decades, and hosts “Thacker Mountain Radio,” a live radio show with author readings and musical performances that airs on Mississippi Public Radio, as well as the annual Oxford Conference on the Book.

Every Friday, CCC’s “Beyond the Book” speaks with the editors and reporters of “Publishers Weekly” for an early look at the news that publishers, editors, authors, agents and librarians will be talking about when they return to work on Monday.

Joining CCC’s Chris Kenneally from New Haven with a preview of the 2013 session is Tina Weiner, Yale Publishing Course founder and director. Before taking her latest role at Yale, Tina Weiner was the Publishing Director of Yale University Press, one of the largest American university presses. During her tenure, Weiner was instrumental in forging co-publishing and distribution arrangements with many art museums in the U.S. and abroad; she was also the liaison with YUP’s London office.

In 2012, Kenneally visited the YPC’s book publishing program, where he learned from Kirsty Melville, President and Publisher, Andrews McMeel Universal, about an intriguing copyright challenge for cartoonist-humorist Matthew Inman, creator of the hit Web feature, “The Oatmeal.” Check out that interview here.

Let’s start with the sunny side: Freelance journalism has never had it so good, as “smart” devices and digital distribution make it possible for more men and women than ever to contribute their reporting and opinions to conversations in the public square.

And then, there’s the dark side: Freelance journalism has never has it so bad, as the flood of content online washes away traditional business models and scatters advertising dollars to the winds.

The annual conference of the American Society of Journalists and Authors, April 25-27 in New York’s Roosevelt Hotel, offers dozens of educational sessions to help freelance writers make the most of the opportunities awaiting them, while avoiding the dangers that might keep them from success. From the ASJA headquarters in Times Square, Alexandra Cantor Owens, executive director, gives CCC’s Chris Kenneally an early look at the programming.

Over at the London Book Fair, attendees have argued the future of copyright, and debated the question: “Amazon: Friend or Foe?” Winners at Europe’s premier book publishing event for 2013, says Andrew Albanese, Publishers Weekly senior writer, may not be publishers after all, but authors, given events at the Fair’s Digital Zone.

“From its beginnings in 2009 as a sleepy corridor of Earls Court, the Digital Zone is quickly becoming the pounding heartbeat of the fair,” Albanese tells CCC’s Chris Kenneally. “All of which is likely to have an impact on coming London Book Fairs both in terms of who attends, and who comes to exhibit.”

Every Friday, CCC’s “Beyond the Book” speaks with the editors and reporters of “Publishers Weekly” for an early look at the news that publishers, editors, authors, agents and librarians will be talking about when they return to work on Monday.