This morning, Smashwords launched Library Direct, a new service that allows libraries and library networks to acquire and establish large opening collections of ebooks direct from Smashwords. Commitments have been with three library systems so far, with each acquiring some variation of Smashwords' top 10,000 best-selling titles. The three library systems involved in today's announcement are Douglas County Libraries in Colorado; The Internet Archive; and a California-based network of 220 libraries known as Califa....

"We knew this day was coming," writes Smashwords founder Mark Coker, on his company's blog.  "Self-published ebook authors are landing on the New York Times bestseller list in a big way." As for myself,  I cancelled my subscription to the Sunday Times ages ago (too expensive; impossible to read in one week), so I probably won't get a chance to experience the irony of seeing this on newsprint. But in this Sunday's edition of the Times' E-Book Fiction Best Sellers list, you'll see a total of four titles written by Smashwords authors. That's four, people. Four. Four! That's not a typo. In fact,...

  JONATHAN MABERRY is a New York Times best-selling and multiple Bram Stoker Award-winning horror and thriller author, comic book writer, magazine feature writer, playwright, content creator and writing teacher/lecturer. His books have been sold to more than a dozen countries. Besides writing fiction in multiple genres, he's also written many non-fiction books as well. He's always ready to explore new methods of reaching readers. In the interview that follows, Jonathan sits down with David Weir to discuss the secrets to his success. David Weir: You've had an unusually diverse background as a writer of both fiction and non-fiction. What are, for you,...

  Smashwords today released its 5 billionth word. From your fingertips to reader's eyes. The number is difficult to grasp.  These words form 138,071 books. If you typed at 25 words a minute without pause, it would take 200 million minutes to write 5 billion words.  3.3 million hours.  If you typed 8 hours a day, it would take 416,600 days, or 1,141 years.  Imagine the lifetimes of creative output now captured, packaged, immortalized and available for discovery at the click of a button or mouse. Imagine a world without gatekeepers, where you the writer decide when you graduate to become a published author. Imagine...

Smashwords today announced a distribution agreement with Page Foundry, a developer of mobile ebook store apps for Android tablets and smart phones.Below I've inserted images of how the app looks, using a test example of Phoenix, a YA fantasy novel by Smashwords author Jennifer Mason-Black, published by  Musa Publishing. This new relationship will lead to distribution at the following four places: Listings page Book page 1.  ASUS:  Asus, a leading manufacturer of...

From an email I received from Smashwords: FYI, Smashwords is working with Califa, a consortium of 220 California libraries, to support the development of their ebook aggregation service for member libraries.  Library Journal broke the news tonight at http://www.thedigitalshift.com/2012/06/ebooks/califa-lands-325000-in-funding-for-ebook-ownership-project-deal-close-with-smashwords/There are two cool pieces to this:1.  They're going to acquire an opening collection of our top 10,000 best-selling ebooks.2.  Smashwords and Califa will collaborate to create local library publishing portals that will allow patrons to publish and distribute ebooks through Smashwords for acquisition and listing by their local library.  These ebooks will also be available for sale through the Smashwords distribution network, which...

Thanks to Richard Herley for the heads up....

  Heads up.  Effective on or about July 15, Smashwords will begin requiring higher pixel counts on ebook cover images. Why the change?  Starting in August, Apple will require that all new ebook cover images be at least 1,400 pixels wide.  Their previous minimum was 600 pixels. Since Smashwords requires vertical rectangle (height greater than width) images, a new recommended ebook cover might be around 1,600 pixels wide by 2,400 pixels tall.  Why 2,400?  2,400 is 1.5 times 1,600. Pull out a ruler and measure just about any print book and youll get a ratio close to that.  Most good-looking covers have heights...

Don't you always want to know how much money people make?  Well, in this Forbes interview Mark Coker gives us a bit of the inside story.  Lots of other interesting stuff too. The company has grown at a steady clip since. Now a top supplier of titles to the iBookstore, Smashwords reached profitability in September 2010. Coker projects $12 million in revenue this year, double last year’s take. With an expected 2012 pretax profit approaching $1 million, the company intentionally keeps margins slim to squeeze out competitors, though Coker expects fatter profits as the company scales. “It costs essentially the same...

  Until recently, Smashwords 'shipped' new book releases, new book updates and metadata updates to Smashwords retailers (Apple iBookstore, Barnes & Noble, Kobo, Sony, Diesel, Baker & Taylor, etc) on a once-weekly basis.  As promised in December, in the last couple weeks we've begun increasing shipment frequency for the retailers that can support it. About one week ago, we began doing once-per-day shipments of new Premium Catalog titles and metadata updates to Kobo.  This means you can make a price change at Smashwords today, and itll be reflected at Kobo likely within a day or two. Today, we pushed the envelope even further...

From the press release: 3M Library Systems will feature its growing list of offerings for the 3M Cloud Library eBook Lending Service at Book Expo America 2012, to be held June 4-7 at the Javits Center in New York City. Visitors to the 3M Library Systems booth, DZ2417, will learn about 3M Cloud Library’s new partnerships with INscribe Digital, Smashwords, The Rowman & Littlefield Publishing Group and the National Book Network (NBN) which are increasing the eBook system’s total list of offerings to more than 200,000 titles from over 300 publishers. 3M will also share details of its partnership with Smashwords, the leading eBook...

I, my wife, and most people who have read the Promises to Keep quartet of ebooks are big fans of indie author Shayne Parkinson. For those of you unfamiliar with the quartet, I reviewed the books 2 years ago in On Books: The Promises to Keep Quartet and again in On Books: Promises to Keep are Promises Kept, and have been waiting for the next book in the series to arrive. My wife and I are still recommending these books to anyone who asks for an excellent read. In the past week or so, we were wondering if Shayne Parkinson had finally released the next...