Macmillan: We’re eager to reach out to independent e-bookstores

By David Rothman

Far from limiting itself to Amazon, Sony and other giants, Macmillan is eager to reach out to independent bookstores such as Fictionwise and BooksOnBoard.

That’s the word from Fritz Foy, senior vice president of strategic technology at Macmillan.

Earlier, at Macmillan’s request, Amazon had stopped the indies’ feeds for imprints such as St. Martin’s Press. The result was that top titles like Rhett Butler’s People appeared to be gone with the wind, at least for BooksOnBoard and others. But as related by Macmillan yesterday, the reasons were far from nefarious.

Territorial rights issues

Rather there were international rights issues with a number of complexities involved. Just who are the true right-holders, for example, of various books? Amazon’s e-systems, as I understand it, and Fritz can correct me if I’m wrong, didn’t provide for all the possibilities. Rights-holder can include authors, publishers, other corporations, you name it.

Macmillan has been working to correct this so the feeds can be restored.

In Macmillan’s own words

Meanwhile here’s the lowdown directly from Fritz: “We have no direct relationship with BooksOnBoard (nor with Fictionwise, also mentioned in your blog entry). BooksOnBoard had been getting its content from Amazon. As a result of problems relating to Amazon’s distribution of our content to unaffiliated third-party sites (problems not specific to BooksOnBoard), we asked Amazon to suspend all such distribution so we can review the situation.

“We are looking into the idea of direct relationships with BooksOnBoard and other Mobipocket distributors and look forward to being in conversation with them soon. It is certainly not our intent to limit our electronic content to select big players. Quite the contrary, our goal is to put in place the systems and agreements that will enable it to be distributed as widely as possible.”

Strong .epub supporter

OK, gang, that’s good news. On top of everything else, Fritz tells me Macmillan remain a strong supporter of the .epub standard and is also hoping for interoperable DRM to accompany it. While I’m hardly a fan of DRM, interoperable DRM is far, far better than today’s totally proprietary approach. As Macmillan’s situation shows, publishing is complicated enough without a zillion and one e-book formats.

Macmillan, by the way, is the new name for the U.S. arm of the global Holtzbrinck Group and, beyond St. Martin’s, includes such distinguished imprints as Farrar, Straus and Giroux. Hey, let’s hope the time comes when FSG books from greats such as Philip Roth will easily be available all over e-bookdom!

A Kindle angle

Now here’s yet another angle. Keep in mind that under the Kindle model, the hardware is closely associated with content and an owner who lives in such and such country. And yes, you guessed it: as a result of the Kindle, territorial issues are now more on the minds of publishers than before, according to Fritz.

Technorati Tags: Fritz Foy , Holtzbrinck , Macmillan , Ficitonwise , BooksOnBoard