TOC Publishing News: News from the Future of Publishing

Google's Browser-Based Plan for Ebook Sales

Mon, 01 Jun 2009 08:59:38 -0500

BEA '09 may be remembered as the moment when Google formally entered the ebook market. From the New York Times:

Mr. [Tom] Turvey [director of strategic partnerships at Google] said Google's program would allow consumers to read books on any device with Internet access, including mobile phones, rather than being limited to dedicated reading devices like the Amazon Kindle. "We don't believe that having a silo or a proprietary system is the way that e-books will go," he said.

He said that Google would allow publishers to set retail prices. Amazon lets publishers set wholesale prices and then sets its own prices for consumers. In selling e-books at $9.99, Amazon takes a loss on each sale because publishers generally charge booksellers about half the list price of a hardcover -- typically around $13 or $14.

In addition -- and this is pure conjecture on my part -- Google's push into HTML 5 is a potential shot across the bow of e-reader manufacturers. Assuming it's widely implemented, HTML 5 will further blur the line between standalone software and Web browsers/cloud-based content. Toss in Google's Chrome browser and the Gears plugin and you can see how the dots (might) connect.

According to the Times, Google intends to launch its ebook project in 2009. This effort is separate from the pending Book Search agreement.

Twitter Scorecard for Publishers

Thu, 21 May 2009 12:16:36 -0500

Recently Publisher's Weekly published an article The Twitter Scorecard that showed which Publishers were using Twitter. I found the piece missing key elements that would provide more insight to their question "So who is twittering, and how effectively?" I believe that if you are asking how effectively we are using Twitter, there is considerable more data needed than was presented. In my opinion, the number of Followers is not a complete measure of effectiveness. In fairness, PW did not say they were attempting to be comprehensive or complete in their scorecard, so I thought I would provide the data that is available mixed with some of my own obtained by scraping. So, I'll attempt to fill-in the scorecard a bit more.

First a note on who is behind the publisher accounts. O'Reilly as a company has oodles of Tweeters who blog about work, life, interests, etc., including @timoreilly who is nearing the half-million followers threshold. I suspect other publishers have the same army of tweeters too, but the data below is is just for the publisher account only. Oftentimes, these sort of accounts are run by PR groups in a Publishing company.

Below, you will find the same list of publishers contained in the original article with the addition of the following column headers and data:

Pub_Twitter is the Publisher account on Twitter. This list was created by PW and am not sure what the criteria was. Followers is the number of people that are following the publisher. These numbers are already off as many of these publishers have added many new followers since the original writing. I kept the same number that PW reported. Following is how many users the publisher follows. Updates is how many tweets the publisher has posted since the account was created. Content is the most popular words the publisher uses in their tweets. Url is a link to a wordle that visualizes the corpus of tweets for the publisher. At the bottom of the table, you will see All Publishers which shows averages and the link includes all words in a visual wordle.

Pub_Twitter	Followers	Following	Updates	Content	URL
@AAKnopf	1,581	390	495	Book, New, Read, RT	http://twitpic.com/5k982
@AtriaBooks	1,809	1,813	257	Book, ChetTheDog , Dog, New	http://twitpic.com/5k97i
@BantamDell	1,987	1,125	244	Blood, Page, Free, Literary	http://twitpic.com/5k95r
@ChelseaGreen	5,003	5,296	4185	Green, RT, Thanks, Book	http://twitpic.com/5k93w
@DCComics	2,176	0	0	---
@DoubleDayPub	1,057	622	137	Lost, RT, Pygmy, New	http://twitpic.com/5k908
@FreePressBooks	516	387	16	Book, Check, Mason, tinyurl	http://twitpic.com/5k8yu
@GrandCentralPub	3,726	3,004	671	Thanks, RT, Book, UR	http://twitpic.com/5k8xd
@GroveAtlantic	268	59	297	Wetlands, Hely , Books, tinyurl	http://twitpic.com/5k8uc
@HarlequinBooks	2,187	159	776	Harlequin, Romance, Author, Free	http://twitpic.com/5k8qn
@HarperPerennial	805	459	149	RT, Book, Story, Read	http://twitpic.com/5k8oq
@LittleBrown	5,999	6,238	1359	RT, Author, Scarecrow, Book	http://twitpic.com/5k8mj
@OReillyMedia	7,340	3,640	2073	O'Reilly, RT, New, Book	http://twitpic.com/5k8l2
@ThomasNelson	678	834	182	Announced, List, Best, Times	http://twitpic.com/5k8g8
@TinHouseBooks	892	162	58	Forgot, New, Tin, Books	http://twitpic.com/5k8c7
@TorBooks	3,995	2,056	1525	Post, Tor, Blog , New	http://twitpic.com/5k89z
@VintageAnchor	1,643	1,278	237	RT, Tonight, Book, New	http://twitpic.com/5k86u
@VintageBooks	783	448	348	Vintage, Book, Read, Books	http://twitpic.com/5k84j
@WorkmanPub	1,485	562	174	RT, Book, Great, Books	http://twitpic.com/5k80s
All Publishers(avg)	2,312	1,502	694		http://twitpic.com/5k9p4

I am thinking of making this a quarterly scorecard for 2009. Before I do that, are there meaningful and obtainable measures you would like to see added to the scorecard? What are the real measures: Sales increases? Information disseminated more efficiently and targeted? Increasing the feeling of community? What elements do you think should be measured in a Twitter Scorecard? Finally, if you are a publisher using Twitter and want to be included in future scorecards, let me know. I am mikeh {at} oreilly {dot} com or @mikehatora on Twitter.

Kindle Comes to the iPhone

Wed, 04 Mar 2009 09:20:15 -0500

Users of the iPhone and iPod Touch can now tap into Amazon's Kindle store with the free Kindle for iPhone application. From The New York Times:

The move comes a week after Amazon started shipping the updated version of its Kindle reading device. It signals that the company may be more interested in becoming the pre-eminent retailer of e-books than in being the top manufacturer of reading devices.

Amazon is positioning the iPhone app as a gap filler: nibble on book content while waiting at the airport, in line, at a restaurant, etc., but settle in for deep reading with the original Kindle (or, presumably, the printed edition). Toward that end, the Times says Amazon is using a bookmark feature that keeps a reader's spot as they switch devices.

Reaction to the Kindle iPhone App

I'll be adding to this list over the next few days as more coverage appears (I highly recommend following the real-time Kindle trend on Twitter). Please share additional links and your own Kindle/iPhone analysis through the comments area.

Hands on: Kindle for iPhone a great Kindle companion
(Chris Foresman, Ars Technica)

Clicking on the "Get Books" button on the Home screen instructs users to got to Amazon's Kindle Store via a computer for "the best shopping experience." And they aren't kidding; while there is a link that will open the Kindle Store in MobileSafari, browsing and buying books this way is just plain frustrating. The Kindle's own integrated buying is far simpler in comparison. Apple presumably has this restriction in place so that developers don't abuse the App Store system, giving away free apps on Apple's dime and then selling content elsewhere. Perhaps Amazon can build an iPhone-browsable version of the Kindle Store and display it via an embedded browser, or better yet, perhaps Amazon and Apple can come to some sort of agreement to allow in-app purchasing.

First Impressions of Kindle on iPhone
(Walt Mossberg, AllThingsD)

... it is a solid basic app for reading books, and is especially valuable if you already own a hardware Kindle, as I do. In my brief tests, the iPhone app synchronized rapidly and perfectly with my purchased library of Kindle books on Amazon's servers, and allowed me to retrieve a previously purchased e-book, without paying again, just as my hardware Kindle does. It also synchronized to the furthest page I had read in that book on my Kindle. After reading for awhile on the iPhone, I performed that process in reverse, and my Kindle took me to the same spot where I had quit reading on the iPhone.

Kindle for iPhone Review
(Perrin Stewart, 148Apps)

... it's worth having the app on your device for the access to Amazon's virtual library alone. In many cases, the pricing on Kindle versions of books are much cheaper than other ebook stores (compare the Kindle version of "The Graveyard Book" for $9.99 to the Fictionwise version which is $17.99 and the stand-alone iTunes store app which is $17.99, for instance), and they often have books that other stores do not.

Expectation of Fair Pricing, Not Free

Mon, 23 Feb 2009 09:04:13 -0500

At Dear Author, a post stating that not all content should be expected to be free; rather it must be provided, free or not, in a realistic understanding of consumer needs and expectations, which might mean changing the way you do business.

What content providers must realize is that a changing business model wherein revenues are no longer captured in the same way does not mean that content is not without value or that people will not pay, in some way, to use that content. I think many people recognize that in order to have worthwhile content, we must pay in some way for it. Consumers have reduced the value of the album, but have not determined that music itself is without value. Consumers might believe that digital books have reduced cost given the costs of production, distribution and warehousing; but it is not our belief that books are without value altogether or that all books must be provided for free. I think what consumers are looking for is a fair trade. Content creators provide the best content they possibly can and for a fair price allow the consumers to utilize it in the way that it fits into their lives.

Amazon Announces Kindle 2

Mon, 09 Feb 2009 11:16:15 -0500

I've got just enough time between TOC tutorial sessions for a quick Kindle 2 post.

As anticipated, Amazon unveiled Kindle 2 this morning. The $359 update is thinner (0.36 inches) and lighter (10 ounces) than the original Kindle. It also includes updated navigation, more storage (2GB; approximately 1,500 titles) and a screen capable of handling 16 shades of gray. Kindle 2 will be released on Feb. 24.

The one feature that really caught my eye is the Kindle's new text-to-speech function:

You can switch back and forth between reading and listening, and your spot is automatically saved. Pages automatically turn while the content is being read, so you can listen hands-free.

Engadget and CNET live-blogged the announcement.

Safari Books Online Goes Mobile

Mon, 09 Feb 2009 09:04:34 -0500

Like much of the publishing world, I'm eager to hear about Amazon's latest version of the Kindle. But that's not the only news today. I'm sitting here at TOC and talking to John Chodacki from Safari Books Online and, with a smile on his face, he's showing me beta version of m.safaribooksonline.com. (In full disclosure, Safari is a joint venture between O'Reilly and Pearson.)

The smile is well deserved. It looks great, it's fast, and I love the stripped-down navigation and lack of clutter. It's got a couple of bugs, and I don't like that I can't read our highly designed Head First books, but it's a Beta.

The mobile version will be released on 23 February, and if you're a Safari subscriber and have feedback, send it to safarimobile AT safaribooksonline DOT com. If you're not already a subscriber, you can get a free trial.

Google Opens Mobile Access to Public-Domain Books

Thu, 05 Feb 2009 14:00:00 -0500

Via a Google press release, word that visiting books.google.com/m provides mobile access to 1.5 million public-domain books from within Google Book Search:

Today, we're making it possible for anyone with an Android or an iPhone to find and read more than 1.5 million public domain books in the US (more than half a million outside the US) in the Google Book Search index for free on their mobile phone, from anywhere with Internet access. It's possible for a commuter on a passenger train to read classics like Pride and Prejudice right along with lesser known works like Novels and Letters of Jane Austen, or for a student in India to read Shakespeare's "Hamlet" on her iPhone, all via a simple website accessible from your mobile phone.

So far, the mobile edition only offers browser-based access (Web-style scrolling, no offline access, no remember-my-place), but an interesting addition to the emerging and important mobile reading space. Screenshot below (or click here if you can't see the screenshot).

Google will be at next week's TOC Conference talking about the past, present and future of GBS.

The Economic Realities of Digital-Only Newspapers

Mon, 02 Feb 2009 08:58:37 -0500

Alan Mutter has an incisive analysis explaining why an all-digital strategy would be unacceptably painful for the majority of established newspapers:

Because newspapers on average derive approximately 90% of their sales from print advertising, the only ink-on-paper newspapers that can afford to attempt digital-only publishing are the ones that are irreversibly losing money. Moving to digital publishing is the last, best hope to salvage at least some value from their waning franchises.

But those web-only franchises would produce far less cash than their print predecessors, reducing the value of those businesses by several magnitudes. How much less? A conventional newspaper moving to online-only publishing might produce at best 10% of the cash generated by its print-plus-online predecessor.

This would be catastrophic for any of the newspaper companies that operate today on the premise of selling both print and interactive advertising. This is especially true for the many publishers that borrowed billions in recent years to finance acquisitions that for the most part have not produced sufficient profits to service the loans.

New York Times Settles Linking Suit

Tue, 27 Jan 2009 09:56:18 -0500

In what many of us thought was a slightly bizarre case, the New York Times Co. has settled with GateHouse Media in a suit attempting to cease the automated aggregation of Gatehouse content on Boston.com's affiliated properties (Boston.com is owned by the Times Co.). It is not clear why the settlement was reached, since precedence was on the side of the Times' operation.

Mathew Ingram examines the settlement at the Nieman Journalism Lab:

Because while the settlement is not a legally-binding precedent -- the one piece of what might be called good news -- it still involves the New York Times voluntarily refraining from what many would argue is perfectly defensible behaviour. As Joshua Benton notes in his post at the Nieman Journalism Lab, that could well embolden other publications to launch similar cases, on the assumption that if the NYT caved then someone else might too. [Links included in original post.]

Amazon Dropping Non-Amazon Ebook Formats (Sort of)

Tue, 27 Jan 2009 08:00:00 -0500

Via Publishers Weekly, Amazon announced Monday it will stop offering ebooks in formats other than Kindle and Mobipocket:

In the future, the online retailer says it plans to offer only e-books in the Kindle format (for wireless download to its Kindle reading device) and the Mobipocket format, both of which are owned by Amazon.

A contact at Amazon has clarified that apparently this change only applies to the Kindle:

This does not apply to eDocs because they are not DRM-protected. This only applies to DRM-protected eBooks.

A follow-up question about Kindle support of EPUB resulted in a polite but firm redirect to "the Kindle team."

I know Amazon is a big company, and I know all too well how difficult intra-office communication can be even at a much smaller company like O'Reilly, but with Amazon in particular it's really easy to get the sense that the left hand has very little idea what the right hand is doing (or perhaps "third left tentacle doesn't know what the right tentacle is doing" is more appropriate).

"None of this is good or bad; it just is"

Thu, 22 Jan 2009 11:21:36 -0500

Lev Grossman takes a pragmatic look at the changing state of authors, readers, and the definition of publishing:

Self-publishing has gone from being the last resort of the desperate and talentless to something more like out-of-town tryouts for theater or the farm system in baseball. It's the last ripple of the Web 2.0 vibe finally washing up on publishing's remote shores. After YouTube and Wikipedia, the idea of user-generated content just isn't that freaky anymore.

And there's actual demand for this stuff. In theory, publishers are gatekeepers: they filter literature so that only the best writing gets into print. But [Lisa] Genova and [Brunonia] Barry and [Daniel] Suarez got filtered out, initially, which suggests that there are cultural sectors that conventional publishing isn't serving. We can read in the rise of self-publishing not only a technological revolution but also a quiet cultural one--an audience rising up to claim its right to act as a tastemaker too.

(Via the Reading 2.0 list)

Film Criticism and YouTube Don't Play Nice

Fri, 16 Jan 2009 08:58:53 -0500

In an essay catalyzed by YouTube's removal of a film criticism archive, which included ripped clips from copyrighted movies, Matt Zoller Seitz addresses the disconnect between takedown policies and the gray areas of digital culture:

There should be a way to distinguish between piracy-for-profit (or unauthorized, free redistribution) and creative, interpretive, critical or political work that happens to use copyrighted material. And there must be an alternative to unilateral takedowns. The issues aren't just legal, they're practical. History has demonstrated that there's no copyright protection that can't be defeated, no corporate edict that can't be subverted. And given the technological sophistication that permits digital watermarking, there ought to be a way to make sampling of any sort, authorized or not, scaled to suit the filmmakers' means, profitable for the rights holders, and as fully automated as the copyright-infringement-scouring that's currently happening all over the Internet.

(Via the Reading 2.0 list)

"Amazon Tax" Moves Forward in New York

Wed, 14 Jan 2009 15:26:04 -0500

A judge has dismissed lawsuits from Amazon and Overstock.com challenging New York's "Amazon tax," which was enacted last year. From the Associated Press:

The law applies to companies that don't have offices in New York, but have at least one person in the state who works as an online agent -- someone who links to a Web site and receives commissions for related sales.

In this case, "agent" is synonymous with "affiliate." Amazon and other online retailers share a cut of revenue generated by affiliate referrals. If further appeals go against Amazon and, as expected, other states jump on the sales tax bandwagon, affiliate programs of all sorts could take a major hit.

The AP notes that the law applies to "companies that have $10,000 or more in New York sales." There's some confusion around this $10,000 figure -- does it apply to companies that run affiliate programs (e.g. Amazon) and generate $10,000 or more in New York-based sales, or does it refer to affiliates who earn $10,000 through revenue share agreements? According to Law.com, the company that sells the products is held to the $10,000 standard. As such, a company could not skirt the law by cutting off individual New York-based affiliates before they reach $10,000 in referral sales. To avoid collecting New York sales tax altogether, companies would have to limit the combined income from all New York affiliates to less than $10,000.

(Via the Reading 2.0 list)

Palm's webOS Represents Major Shift for Syncing and Data

Mon, 12 Jan 2009 11:41:28 -0500

In an article covering the Palm Pre mobile device, Ars Technica makes a very important point about how devices utilize network connectivity, and what the assumptions are underlying their models of data storage and access:

Users just make changes to their data (contacts, calendar, mail, etc.), and Palm's webOS handles committing those changes to whatever canonical data source it is accessing in the cloud. And herein lies the most important difference between the webOS and Apple's iPhone OS: the iPhone was originally designed under the assumption that the canonical source of a user's data (contacts, calendar, music, tasks, etc.) is a Mac. Palm's webOS, in contrast, presumes that cloud-based services are the canonical source for your data (with the possible exception of media, which we don't know about yet) ...

Palm's webOS does not presume any sort of tether at all. The company has totally ditched the idea that you will use this phone in conjunction with a specific "main PC" that contains the canonical, authoritative repository of your data. Instead, webOS draws seamlessly on a variety of data services--not data repositories, but cloud-based services that actively feed the device both data and critical context.

This is a deep, fundamental break with both the iPhone and previous, repository-based smartphone usage models, and it's important enough that other smartphones are bound to follow.

Google Doesn't Have Answers for Newspapers

Thu, 08 Jan 2009 09:16:19 -0500

Fortune Magazine has an interesting interview with Eric Schmidt about Google's relationship with newspapers:

Maybe their time [newspapers'] has just come and gone?

No. They don't have a problem of demand for their product, the news. People love the news. They love reading, discussing it, adding to it, annotating it. The Internet has made the news more accessible. There's a problem with advertising, classifieds and the cost itself of a newspaper: physical printing, delivery and so on. And so the business model gets squeezed.

So what else can Google do?

We have a mechanism that enhances online subscriptions, but part of the reason it doesn't take off is that the culture of the Internet is that information wants to be free. We've tried to get newspapers to have more tightly integrated products with ours. We'd like to help them better monetize their customer base. We have tools that make that easier. I wish I had a brilliant idea, but I don't. These little things help, but they don't fundamentally solve the problem.