MacRumors is quoting a Publishers Weekly article wrap-up of today's Apple trial, and the surprising bit is the 20 percent claim. Here's the quote: The government also focused on the relative success of the iBookstore asking Moerer what marketshare the store held in the months after launch (about 20% Moerer said) and what its marketshare was after several years of operation and adding Random House in 2011 (also about 20%). I don't buy it. Let's start with the statement itself. The market share a couple of months after iBooks launch was 20 percent? And it was still 20 percent after adding Random House? Call...

Dear Jim, When I wrote to you the other day by email with a brief note asking if Publishers Weekly might want to link to the recent news on NPR and at the Christian Science Monitor in the U.S., and in The Guardian and the Financial Times in London, about a new literary genre called "cli-fi", you replied with a terse note sent from your iPhone that read: "not interested." Jim, you seem like a very likable fellow. You're editorial director of PW, the most prestigious print magazine in the book trade industry. I've been a PW reader since I was in college....

Publishers Weekly approaches the subject of the digital backlist with a fresh angle in a recent blog: They compile a list of the best-sellers of yesteryear and then see how many they can find Kindle editions for. The results? "Looking through PW’s archives at the top 25 bestselling books of both 1992 and 1982 in fiction and nonfiction (100 titles total), we found 56 books that had Kindle e-book editions. Between fiction and nonfiction, the former fared much better: 39 of the 50 fiction titles had e-book editions, compared to 17 of the 50 nonfiction titles." They propose several ideas to account for the disparity....

More than a few self-published authors, of course, have found serious success through various channels over the years—selling a vast amount of books on their own, for instance, or having their previously self-published book picked up by a big publishing concern. And yet, contrary to popular belief, not every self-published author actually wants to be picked up by a mainstream publishing house. Some are more than happy working independently, and pocketing as much money from their DIY publishing project as possible. This topic was brought up last Sunday, March 10, during the Self-Publishing in the Age of E panel at the SXSW in Austin, Texas. The...

I didn't even realize the Christian Science Monitor had its own literary/books blog. I stumbled upon it yesterday (it's called Chapter & Verse), and like the rest of the paper, it's wonderful. A post that went live two days ago caught my attention; it's about a so-called "Business Model Scorecard" that was recently released by the American Library Association, and it "asks library staff members to rate e-book offerings from publishers on factors like availability," according to the article. From the post: "The scorecards grade criteria from one to five and include 15 questions. Questions range from the price publishers are charging libraries for...

By Jeremy Hill | for Technology Tell Earlier this year, Amazon turned on a new service for its Kindle Fire HD tablets called FreeTime. FreeTime is a kid-friendly interface that allows parents to pick and choose which apps, videos and web content their kids can access. On Tuesday, Amazon announced its plans to automate the service with something it calls Kindle FreeTime Unlimited. Unlike the regular version of FreeTime, FreeTime Unlimited will cost Amazon Prime subscribers $2.99 per month for each child, or $6.99 for a family subscription. If you aren’t a Prime member, the price jumps to $4.99 and $9.99 respectively. For...

The content production and digital media company Aptara recently released its 4th Annual Ebook Survey of Publishers, which proposes to offer "unprecedented insight into eBook publishers' business and production practices." I haven't yet had a chance to read the entire report—it's a 41-page long PDF—but you can download the PDF yourself by clicking here. From the report, here are a few sample results: • 31% of eBook publishers produce enhanced eBooks, though only 12% correlate the enhancements with a positive impact on sales • Amazon.com is the most popular sales channel, used by 68% of eBook publishers. Apple’s iBookstore comes in second at 58%. • Amazon is also the most lucrative eBook sales channel. Publishers’ own websites come in a distant second place...

Back in March, the Digital Digest profiled Princeton Shorts, a new short-form e-book program launched last fall by Princeton University Press. At least two more AAUP presses have launched short e-book programs this spring: Stanford, with Stanford Briefs, and North Carolina, with UNC Press E-Book Shorts. The basic idea of short-form digital is not original to university presses. Anticipating the evolving desires of e-readership, Amazon launched its Kindle Singles format in January 2011, canvassing for medium-length (5,000-30,000) word pieces ("longer than a magazine article, shorter than a book.") Publishers Weekly reports that they are selling just fine, with the top two or three Singles consistently ranking among...

From an article by Kim Stricland in ChicagoNow, who is a self-published author.  She talks about her expeirence with PW Select: Publishers Weekly is a venue for book reviews, and for books published primarily by traditional publishers. Yet, when they found a way to capitalize on the self-publishing craze, I can’t help but think the poison at the end of their pen in the predominantly negative reviews [in the PW Select quarterly guide] has more to do with self-preservation than any real interest in fostering a relationship with the self-publishing industry. ... What every author wants from a review of this type is...

From Publishers Weekly: Publishers Weekly and Vook have reached a deal that will let self-published authors get access to Vook’s new e-book creation tool as well as participate in PW Select’s listing and review service. Under PW Select+, authors will receive all the benefits of PW Select as well as a host of options for using Vook’s e-book creation and publishing platform. Those benefits include conversion of authors’ manuscripts to an e-book format acceptable to B&N.com, Apple iBooks, and Amazon.com; automatic distribution within those three sales channels including full reporting; a distribution-ready EPub file for the author’s use in his or her...

From Publishers Weekly: Beginning September 15, Publishers Weekly's romance and science fiction/fantasy/horror reviews sections will accept digital galleys for review consideration. This includes galleys for digital-first publications in those genres. We especially encourage small and independent presses to make use of the new system, which we hope will make it easier to send us galleys three to four months ahead of publication. Uploading digital galleys is also an eco-friendly alternative to packaging and shipping physical galleys. All of PW's current submission guidelines apply to digital galleys. We accept .epub, .mobi, .rtf, and .pdf formats. Please...

Yesterday I mentioned the importance of pricing to e-book sales, using the example of a 1992 novel that shot to the top of e-bestseller lists after going on sale for 99 cents. However, 99 cents is not always the right answer. Publishers Weekly has a post looking at ten pricing rules that Vook has come up with after studying what elements make e-books and apps successful. Vook determined that it was not simply a matter of price, but also category. Proper categorization helps books get discovered and in turn contributes to what Vook calls "lift...