We’ve lots of places to visit in this edition of Indie News Beat, beginning with a neat article headlined There Is No Publishing Industry, in which John Cavnar-Johnson suggests that what we generally understand as the publishing industry can now be broken down into four distinct “information delivery” industries, which are each advancing towards digitalisation at their own speeds. Continue reading “Indie News Beat: Is there a publishing industry or isn’t there?”
Tag: Apple
Format Diversity Can Lead to Higher Sales
We indie authors work hard to coax readers to buy our books. When even a trickle of sales of an ebook is cause for euphoria, it astounds me that so many authors ignore 38% of the American ebook market and the majority of the Canadian market.
I am a regular visitor to IU. It’s a great site for trailers, sneak peeks, and advice. My only disappointment is the near exclusivity of Kindle as an ebook format. Most of the freebies offered on Fridays are Kindle ebooks. Twice, when I decided to buy a book after watching a trailer on IU, the Kindle-only format stopped me. Sure, I can read a Kindle book via a special app on my laptop, but that is not where I do my pleasure reading. Continue reading “Format Diversity Can Lead to Higher Sales”
Department of Justice Decision Released
Dept. of Justice has determined that the proposed “final judgment” provides “an appropriate and effective remedy” for the antitrust violations. They are quoted as saying that the comments to dismiss the case were being submitted “by those who have an interest in seeing consumers pay more for e-books…”
The DoJ showed little interest in the comments from some of the big players in the industry, including Barnes & Noble, Books-A-Million and the Authors Guild. They go further to say that arguments that Amazon will eventually monopolize the e-book industry as “highly speculative at best.”
The DoJ also noted that not all authors objected to the settlement. Apparently, many mainstream or traditionally published authors were against the settlement. The largest group in favor of the settlement was self-published authors. In one comment by a group of self-published authors, the traditional publishers and literary agents were described as “… all kinds of middlemen which have gone from being indispensable to optional … “ Continue reading “Department of Justice Decision Released”
The Impact of the Dept. of Justice Investigation
Last week, on March 24, 2012, we looked at a brief history of eBooks, Publishers and the Agency vs. Wholesale pricing model. You can review that post here.
Ironically,on Thursday March 29, 2012, the Huffington Post ran a story by Mark Coker the founder of Smashwords. Most of you are familiar with Smashwords as one of the first distributors to supply eBooks to retailers including, Apple iBookstore, Barnes & Noble, Sony, Kobo, the Diesel eBook Store, and Baker and Taylor. Continue reading “The Impact of the Dept. of Justice Investigation”