We previously mentioned Penguin’s decision to stop making new e-book titles available to libraries in the USA and the UK. The Digital Shift reports that decision extends to downloadable digital audiobooks as well. A message from Overdrive yesterday explains this applies to audiobook titles released after 11/14/2011. In an apparently unrelated move, Amazon-owned BrillianceAudio will also stop offering downloadable audiobook titles. It’s not clear exactly why Penguin is doing this. The reason the company gave for its e-book restrictions was “concerns about the security of the copyright of its authors.” It has not given any explanation for this audiobook restriction. As...

Following up an earlier story about Penguin withholding library e-books in the UK as well as the US, The Bookseller reports that the Publishers Association supports Penguin’s decision to withdraw its e-books. PA c.e.o. Richard Mollet said: "Today's announcement [by Penguin UK] underlines what the Publishers Association has been saying for some time about the risks around e-lending. Whilst publishers are and always have been fully supportive of libraries, it also has to be recognised that in this still developing area, it is right to be concerned about the security of digital files in the...

Yesterday, Simon & Schuster's parent company CBS announced that while the publisher made less money last quarter than the one before, ebook sales accounted for a greater percentage: Publishing revenues for the second quarter of 2011 decreased 3% to $183 million from $189 million for the same prior-year period, as strong growth in the sale of more profitable digital content was offset by lower print book sales. Digital content revenues for the second quarter of 2011 more than doubled last year's second quarter digital sales and represented 15% of Publishing's total revenues. This is in line with what Pearson reported about...

PaidContent has a report on Penguin’s e-book sales by way of an earnings disclosure report from 7its parent company Pearson. The report mentions that Penguin’s global e-book sales increased by 128% over the last year, and now make up 14% of Penguin’s total revenue. This growth rate is actually slower than the 160.1% annual growth reported by the American Association of Publishers for consumer e-books from January through May. Penguin has been doing a number of things to promote e-books in recent months, such as releasing an e-books app based on its “Penguin Classics” line, and helping independent bookstores...

Shelf Awareness notes that Penguin Group (USA) has been printing up in-store displays to remind shoppers that the store sells ebooks as well, then distributing them to independent bookstores: "So far, 40 have been created, and by the time the publisher is finished, some 200 stores will receive a custom easel." It's too bad Google's ebook buying experience is so convoluted—the last time I tried it, I had to create a store account, link my Google account, provide a credit card (even though I've got one stored already with Google), and click buttons and checkboxes on multiple screens. But at...

TechCrunch and the Bookseller have a report on Book Country, a new social-media spinoff project from Penguin, aimed at providing writers and fans of original genre fiction (romance, thrillers, fantasy, and SF) a place to post, discuss, and get reviews of their work. Would-be reviewees are required to read and review at least three other works before they can start getting reviews of their own. The Bookseller calls it a slushpile. TechCrunch is a bit more kind, suggesting it’s a way that people can get discovered. Either way, it seems to be Penguin’s first attempt to co-opt the self-publishing...

Today, I picked up Diane Duane’s novel Omnitopia Dawn from my public library, after placing a hold via the web. It’s a hardcover print book, which is much less useful to me than an e-book. I could read an e-book at work, between calls, on my day job (at least, if it were a DRM-free e-book), thanks to Ibis Reader. I’ll have to read a print book at home, on my own free time that I could be using for something else (such as writing here). If the e-book had been reasonably priced, I would have bought it instead—even...

The UK bookseller Waterstone’s has started selling Hachette e-books again, The Bookseller reports. Waterstone’s had previously stopped selling them two months ago over uncertainty surrounding UK publishers’ switch to agency pricing terms. Waterstone’s is now on agency terms with HarperCollins and Hachette, but has yet to reach them with Penguin. Waterstones has stopped offering points on its membership card program for any e-book purchases, given that this would conflict with publishers’ agency control. W H Smith started selling Penguin and Hachette books on agency pricing last week, and Amazon has been selling them already. However, some prices are still...

The Bookseller reports that UK publishers are continuing to move forward with the implementation of agency pricing for e-books, and expect Amazon.co.uk to capitulate to their terms within a matter of weeks. A few days ago Amazon posted a letter decrying the move to agency pricing, claiming that it was “damaging” to all parties involved (but suggesting by its very existence that Amazon knows it’s fighting a losing battle at this point). The statement prompted Penguin UK deputy c.e.o. Tom Weldon to defend the model in a letter to agents. He said: “We believe...

The Bookseller notes that Penguin is now negotiating with the Wylie Agency over e-book rights for the three Penguin titles Wylie was publishing through Odyssey Editions. This comes shortly after Random House struck a deal with Wylie over its 13 of Odyssey’s 20 books. If Penguin succeeds in extricating its e-book rights from Wylie’s clutches, that only leaves Odyssey with four titles—and it’s anyone’s guess how long those will stay once their print publishers come calling now that Wylie’s been shown to be willing to deal. Not really so much of a publisher anymore, is it?...

This is extremely exciting news for me. I have long been a fan of the Arabian Nights but it has been very hard to find a decent translation. The Nights is quite racy and all of the stuff we have been exposed to over the years has been quite heavily censored (or should I say "Appled"). I have the 16 volume Burton translation published by the Burton Society, the only complete, unexpurgated translation I'm aware of, but Burton's prose is really, really weird. It is not easy reading. In 2008, I ordered, from Amazon UK, the...

The Guardian has an interview with Penguin chief executive John Makinson, who also runs a small independent bookstore with his brother. Makinson is a newly converted iPad reader, carrying an iPad loaded with a number of books on a trip to India. He has a number of things to say about the iPad, and about e-books in general. "It does redefine what we do as publishers and I feel, compared with most of my counterparts, more optimistic about what this means for us," [Makinson] says. "Of course there are issues around copyright protection and there...