eBook Implications for Hollywood
Posted on April 26, 2011
Years from now February of 2011 will be considered a media turning point.
It was the first month when e-books outsold all other categories including paperbacks. According to the Association of American Publishers (AAP), domestic e-book sales tripled from the year-earlier month to over $90 million. Unfortunately for the established industry the news is probably worse than reported because AAP only records e-book sales for sixteen traditional publishers. Yet activity at Amazon.com confirms an enthusiastic surge of self-published titles not included in AAP numbers.
Download audio narration to iPod, iPhone, or iPad here — five minutes
Even more significant, self-published authors are discovering that low price is a viable path to popularity. As the chart below illustrates, the statistical distribution of e-book sales at Amazon.com last Wednesday was bimodal. Over half of the top fifty titles sold at two price points. Sixteen sold for $12.99 and were provided by traditional publishers. But twelve sold for only $0.99 and were presumably self-published. Read more…
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The Silicon Eye
Posted on October 27, 2010
Imagine you’re on yet another tiring business trip and shudder at the thought of dealing with more crowded airports and flight delays. You kill time by reading all The Wall Street Journal. One article notes that banks will soon raise fees and even charge for checking accounts. You frown and shake your head thinking, “While I work harder in a difficult economy to earn a living and save money bankers coerce a gigantic taxpayer bailout. They show their thanks by raising fees and lowering CD rates. Doesn’t any bank want to help consumers save money?”
Download audio narration here (five minutes).
Presently your flight lands in Denver where you have a ninety minute lay-over before taking off for Salt Lake. You pass an airport billboard sponsored by First Bank of Denver. In the upper left are two prominent words: “Free Books”. Most of the remaining space exhibits three diagrams. They’re actually two-dimensional bar codes, termed QR (Quick Response) codes. They look like a cross between modern art and ink blots. Below each, in small lettering, is an apparent title. The left-most is labeled Treasure Island, the middle one, Moby Dick, and the right-most, The Art of War.
Instructions at the lower left explain how to get a free eBook for each. You merely take a picture of the applicable QR code with a smartphone. The camera functions as a silicon eye directing the phone to a website where the manuscript can be downloaded. At the billboard’s lower right, where a signature might be located on a letter, First Bank says, “We’re here to help you save.” Read more…
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First Billion Dollar eBook
Posted on October 25, 2010
Today’s interview is with Randy Ingermanson who is a “deranged physicist and award winning author”. He also maintains a blog and monthly e-zine about advanced fiction writing. His Ph.D. is from Berkeley where Robert Oppenheimer led development of the atomic bomb and taught a generation or so before Randy arrived. As a high school graduate Randy was named a Presidential Scholar along with others who were among the top 500 in either the SAT or ACT tests.
His stories are at the “intersection of Science Avenue and Faith Boulevard”. Representative novels include Double Vision, Transgression, Premonition, Retribution, and The Fifth Man. Two books won Christy Awards for Futuristic Fiction.
Download audio interview here (25 minutes).
Recently, Randy pondered “what it would take” for an author to make a billion dollars from a book. He concluded if such a goal were possible, it would likely be an e-book for two reasons. First, author royalties on e-books are about ten times greater than for traditional books. Second, authors can better market e-book titles than conventional ones. Read more…
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How to Publish Your eBook at Amazon.com
Posted on October 19, 2010
Today’s video podcast demonstrates how to publish eBooks at Amazon.com. That means millions of Kindle owners can read them along with consumers owning devices like the iPhone and iPad that have Kindle applications. The video speaks for itself, but several points merit emphasis.
Download Video to iPhone, iPod, or iPad by clicking here. (eight minutes)
First, given its relative newness, eBook publishing at Amazon.com is surprisingly un-complex. Anyone with an existing customer account is eligible. Those without one merely need to open a conventional account. There are two basic steps. One is to upload cover art and a publication-ready manuscript in a qualified format. Fortunately the commonly used Microsoft Word is an accepted format. The second step is choosing a price which also determines the royalty. Read more…
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Ideal e-Book Reading Device
Posted on July 27, 2010
It’s increasingly evident that book publishing is undergoing a fundamental transformation. First, for two-and-a-half years Amazon.com pioneered the e-book market toward critical mass, largely keeping industry statistics to themselves. Second, the March iPad launch accelerated matters by initiating an irrevocable chain reaction that has only just begun. Cascading new developments seem to materialize monthly, if not faster.
For example, by unit volume June e-book sales at Amazon.com were eighty-percent greater than hard covers. Earlier this month notable authors such as Pat Conroy and Philip Roth contracted with powerful agents to publish their pre-Internet-era novels as e-books. The arrangement circumvents traditional publishers and increases author royalties. Simultaneously e-book reading devices are proliferating and prices are dropping. Visiting a typical Barnes & Noble store symbolically underscores the magnitude of change. As the leading terrestrial book chain few companies could be more dependent upon physical book sales. Nonetheless, each store now normally exhibits the Nook electronic reader prominently at the entrance. Read more…
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Selling e-Books as Agent
Posted on February 17, 2010
Phil Leigh
Amazon’s grudging agreement to act as agent when selling Macmillan e-books next month has important implications.
An agent is a business partner. However, Macmillan’s partnership notion is not fifty-fifty. The publisher concludes that they contribute more than twice the value of Amazon by taking 70% of the sales price for themselves and leaving only 30% for the online merchant.
There could hardly be a better example of irony considering that the 167-year-old publisher never found enough time to develop an e-book business on its own. Instead, 14-year-old Amazon.com invented the Kindle. To date Amazon has done more than any single business to launch the entire e-book industry, yet it gets the short end of the stick. Read more…
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A Christmas Lesson for Publishers
Posted on December 19, 2009
Santa Claus
One February night in 1938 Philip Van Doren Stern had a dream. The 38 year-old published historian also had a deep interest in fantasy and the macabre. As with most dreams his morning recollections were vague and conflicting. It had something to do with a man who had never been born, or wished he had never been born.
Stern decided to write down his recollections. A narrative began to take shape and with later revisions became a short story he titled The Greatest Gift. It was a simple celebration of things taken for granted. Read more…
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