Penguin Books’ CEO John Makinson gave a presentation in London today where he demonstrated some books/applications–I’m not sure what you’d call them technically–that Penguin plans to sell on the iBook store when the iPad launches later this month. Penguin is doing some pretty inventive stuff with its content, judging by these demos, and I think it points a clear path toward how publishers can provide new offerings that printed books can’t match.
Included in the demo:
- A children’s book that includes interactive activities for the reader: at one point, the child may be asked to help the main character color in a picture before swiping to the next page of the story.
- A reference book based on DK’s The Concise Human Body, where users can tap illustrations to zoom in for a detailed view, then tap again to transition to animated 3D models.
- Networked, community-driven editions of books from the Vampire Academy series, where a reader can both read the book and interact with other readers.
- Travel books that allow readers to develop itineraries and make use of interactive maps.
- An astronomy book that uses GPS and the iPad’s motion sensor to display constellations that match up with the sky above you.
It’s all quite impressive–I especially like the Vampire Academy books, which allow you to read the book traditionally but also extend your level of interaction through a built-in, attractive social network interface.
Makinson suggests that the ePub format can’t handle some of the more advanced content they’ve come up with, so the publisher is planning on releasing apps in many cases. I think this is one area where publishers can claim a huge amount of revenue in the digital book marketplace; it’s a lot harder for an independent or writer to develop a high-concept app than it is to self-publish a “traditional” ebook, and I suspect customers will gladly pay significant amounts of money for books that do more than just display text.
I’m heading to a workshop today to listen to authors, agents, editors, and who knows what else talk about the proposed Google Book Search settlement. It’s being hosted by the Science Fiction & Fantasy Writers of America.
A lot of authors are having trouble deciding whether the settlement is good or bad for them, probably because it’s a little of both when you get right down to it. I tend to side with Google, but then, I tend to think that making every. single. thing. in. the. world. searchable is a Good Thing and should be done, and I have no faith it will happen in the next 20 years without a for-profit corporation getting involved. (And believe me, I am no sycophant of big business.) Read the rest of this entry »
Everyone who writes or publishes wants to know how to use Twitter as a promotional tool to drive sales, and to that end the British book reading website Lovereading–sort of the ugly UK cousin to Goodreads, only with a smaller membership and more directly tied to big publishing houses–just completed a survey of members to ask them about Twitter. The results weren’t favorable to Twitter as an effective recommendation source or promotional tool, with The Bookseller going so far as to write, “The book-buying public may be largely immune to suggestions from Twitter, Facebook and other sites.”
Uh oh.
But wait! Before you dismiss Twitter as an also-ran in marketing, check out who Lovereading surveyed compared to who uses Twitter the most. As with all online communities, the only way to successfully connect is to figure out what kind of person participates in Twitter, and how he uses the service.
Last week, the BBC Radio 4 program Open Book focused on the role of the editor in publishing a work. Host Mariella Frostrup interviewed five editors or author-editor combos about what value an editor–whose job didn’t really formally exist until after World War II–provides.
You can listen to the half-hour show here; the first 10 minutes alone are worth it just to hear Diana Athill talk about the unique editing requirements of Updike, Naipul, and Rhys. But here’s a summary of key points from the full episode:
An editor can help shore up a writer’s weaknesses. Some writers may be masters of language, but need help shaping something into a finished work. Other writers may be great writers but lousy at taking care of other essential life tasks, so they would otherwise never write or publish without someone’s help.
An editor is a guaranteed, and perhaps the only, extremely attentive reader a writer will have. Diana Athill says, “What one learns when you’re working with an eidtor, is that actually very few peole get their books read extremely attentively by anybody. A writer is dying to have his or her work read with complete attention. And here is this editor person, and the one thing they have done is they have paid full attention to your work, which is very gratifying.”
An editor may act more like an agent or a music producer. Some editors will work closely with writers to help them determine career steps, going so far as to advise on what sort of book to write next. Others, like Raymond Carver’s editor Gordon Lish, will manipulate the original manuscript so much that their role becomes something more collaborative, or even borderline Svengali-like, as with music producers.
A Stephen King ebook fan on November 9th, 2009. (Photo: Robert Couse-Baker)
Wow! I’m so behind the curve on all the release-date drama over Stephen King’s newest book, Under the Dome, which based on critical reception and fan buzz seems poised to become one of his classics alongside works like The Stand and Misery. I completely missed the news, two weeks ago, that Scribner has decided to delay the release of the ebook edition by a month in order to help drive hardcover sales. This has understandably infuriated those Kindle-owning King fans who have been primed–thanks to Scribner’s own massive marketing campaign–to jump on the book when it comes out next week, but who will now have to wait another month.
I sort of get why they did it, or at least I think I do. Scribner wants consumers to understand that the hardcover retains pride of place in the world of release dates, and if you really want a new book you’ll have to pay a premium by choosing the hardcover. They also want to send a message (to Amazon? surely not to consumers, who have no say over the matter) that the $10 price point for new releases is unacceptable.
I also think I understand why they chose King’s new novel, which is the publishing world’s equivalent to an AT-AT walker. They want to ensure that the experiment works.
But did Scribner choose the wrong battle by trying to reinforce this false hierarchy of print over digital? I think they wasted an opportunity to reset ebook pricing expectations with consumers, and they’re wasting marketing dollars too.
