Independent book marketplace Biblio.com announced today that it has partnered with Literary Tourist to help support and promote independent brick-and-mortar bookstores.
Literary Tourist was launched last week by owner Nigel Beale, who acquired Book Hunter Press in late 2009 and re-created it as a literary destination website and bookstore directory for book lovers. The new site features a refined database of over 8,000 used bookstores including reviews and information about each store. It also contains expanded listings for literary landmarks, rare book libraries, book fairs, writing festivals and other book-related events.
"Our goal with Literary Tourist is to help book lovers find the kind of bookstores, literary locales and pastimes that will add some oomph and excitement to their travels," says Beale. "We hope to make this site one of the best 'literary destinations' on the Web, and in so doing, in a small way, to help pump new blood and energy into literary culture throughout North America, and, if we're successful, around the globe."
Biblio augmented Literary Tourist's existing bookstore database, with its own extensive database of booksellers and bookstores.
The original database first went on-line in 2000. For almost a decade it was updated manually. Beale notes that bookselling and bookstores are changing so quickly that "it is a challenge to keep up with all the closings and start-ups." Both companies have partnered to create an easy solution to this challenge. Literary Tourist uses BiblioDirect, powered by Biblio, for booksellers to maintain and update their directory listings. BiblioDirect also serves as a portal for booksellers to maintain their accounts on Biblio.com, Biblio.co.uk, IOBAbooks.com, ABAA.org.
Through their partnership both companies seek to increase traffic in physical bookstores, keeping these vital cultural institutions and landmarks open while preserving the business of independent bookselling.
Thursday, June 9, 2011
Wednesday, June 1, 2011
Amazon Launches New Publishing Imprint, Montlake Romance
Amazon.com has launched Montlake Romance, the fourth and latest imprint from Amazon Publishing. Connie Brockway, two-time winner of the Romance Writers Association's "RITA Award" for best historical romance, and bestselling author of seventeen novels, including "My Dearest Enemy" and "The Bridal Season," will be the debut author of Montlake Romance. Brockway's new romance, "The Other Guy's Bride," will be published in Fall 2011 and will be available to North American readers in Kindle, print and audio formats at www.amazon.com, as well as at national and independent booksellers.
"Romance is one of our biggest and fastest growing categories, particularly among Kindle customers, so we can't wait to make ‘The Other Guy's Bride' and other compelling titles available to romance fans around the world," said Jeff Belle, Vice President, Amazon Publishing. "We also know our customers enjoy genre fiction of all kinds, so we are busy building publishing businesses that will focus on additional genres as well."
Montlake Romance takes its name from the central Seattle neighborhood of Montlake, and will publish a broad range of front list titles in popular romance sub-genres, including romantic suspense and contemporary and historic romance novels, as well as fantasy and paranormal. The new imprint joins AmazonEncore, AmazonCrossing and Powered by Amazon as part of the Amazon Publishing family. Montlake Romance books will be available to North American readers in Kindle, print and audio formats at www.amazon.com, as well as at national and independent booksellers.
For more information on Montlake Romance and upcoming titles, visit www.amazon.com/montlakeromance.
"Romance is one of our biggest and fastest growing categories, particularly among Kindle customers, so we can't wait to make ‘The Other Guy's Bride' and other compelling titles available to romance fans around the world," said Jeff Belle, Vice President, Amazon Publishing. "We also know our customers enjoy genre fiction of all kinds, so we are busy building publishing businesses that will focus on additional genres as well."
Montlake Romance takes its name from the central Seattle neighborhood of Montlake, and will publish a broad range of front list titles in popular romance sub-genres, including romantic suspense and contemporary and historic romance novels, as well as fantasy and paranormal. The new imprint joins AmazonEncore, AmazonCrossing and Powered by Amazon as part of the Amazon Publishing family. Montlake Romance books will be available to North American readers in Kindle, print and audio formats at www.amazon.com, as well as at national and independent booksellers.
For more information on Montlake Romance and upcoming titles, visit www.amazon.com/montlakeromance.
Sunday, May 8, 2011
Lulu.com Launches New Open Publishing Platform
Lulu.com (http://www.lulu.com/) is releasing the final pieces of its full publishing platform. Now, anyone can be a publisher without having to spend the years and invest the dollars formerly required to build book printing, ebook creation, book and ebook distribution, and book selling businesses.
The Lulu Open Publishing Platform is accessible via application programming interfaces (APIs) enabling publishers, website builders, and entrepreneurial content owners to easily publish the books they and their authors have created. "Lulu is making all the tools we have built over the last eight years available to anyone and everyone to better serve their markets," says Lulu CEO Bob Young. "Our remarkable global book printing network, ebook creation tools, and distribution services are now available to a new generation of publishers and entrepreneurs to serve their markets at lower cost, more profitably than ever before possible."
Lulu's Open Publication APIs enable publishers, businesses, and developers to create web applications, powered by Lulu, and marketed under their own brand names. Today, Lulu is announcing the final pieces of the platform - two new APIs to complete the publishing cycle.
The first, a new Document Conversion API, will convert any Word, RTF, and HTML document to a print-ready PDF. These document conversion tools rely in part on Aspose Corp's world-class solution for Word document conversion. Lulu makes that solution available to anybody who wants to publish a book.
The other is Lulu's new E-Commerce API. This will allow developers to place orders for their users programmatically. Developers will be able to sell their books from their own sites, keeping control of the user's information. After the sale is made, the developer can send the order information to Lulu and access an established global network to print and ship the book directly to customers. The developer is able to easily fulfill all their orders. According to Lulu's Director of Technology, Ryan Bloom, "This is our most requested API, and marks a big step forward for Lulu." Bloom added; "Due to the importance of all aspects of online commerce security, Lulu is looking forward to working closely with those partners who sign on to use our new E-Commerce API tools."
The Lulu Open Publishing Platform is accessible via application programming interfaces (APIs) enabling publishers, website builders, and entrepreneurial content owners to easily publish the books they and their authors have created. "Lulu is making all the tools we have built over the last eight years available to anyone and everyone to better serve their markets," says Lulu CEO Bob Young. "Our remarkable global book printing network, ebook creation tools, and distribution services are now available to a new generation of publishers and entrepreneurs to serve their markets at lower cost, more profitably than ever before possible."
Lulu's Open Publication APIs enable publishers, businesses, and developers to create web applications, powered by Lulu, and marketed under their own brand names. Today, Lulu is announcing the final pieces of the platform - two new APIs to complete the publishing cycle.
The first, a new Document Conversion API, will convert any Word, RTF, and HTML document to a print-ready PDF. These document conversion tools rely in part on Aspose Corp's world-class solution for Word document conversion. Lulu makes that solution available to anybody who wants to publish a book.
The other is Lulu's new E-Commerce API. This will allow developers to place orders for their users programmatically. Developers will be able to sell their books from their own sites, keeping control of the user's information. After the sale is made, the developer can send the order information to Lulu and access an established global network to print and ship the book directly to customers. The developer is able to easily fulfill all their orders. According to Lulu's Director of Technology, Ryan Bloom, "This is our most requested API, and marks a big step forward for Lulu." Bloom added; "Due to the importance of all aspects of online commerce security, Lulu is looking forward to working closely with those partners who sign on to use our new E-Commerce API tools."
Amazon Books Launches Author Interview Series
Amazon.com has premiered "Author Interviews@Amazon," the new author interview series that will be available in a new content destination called The Backstory (www.amazon.com/thebackstory). Author Interviews@Amazon launches with five video interviews, including celebrity chef and James Beard Award-winning Tom Douglas, New York Times bestselling debut author Joshua Foer, young adult authors Holly Black and Cassandra Clare, and Gossip Girl producer John Stephens.
New author interviews will be announced via the Amazon.com Books Facebook page and on Omnivoracious.com, the Amazon.com Books blog. Customers will be able to post questions for visiting authors that will be incorporated into each interview. All edited videos will be available on the book's detail page and accessible from archives in The Backstory.
"We're extremely lucky to have fascinating and talented authors gracing our hallways here at Amazon and taking time to chat with us," said Mari Malcolm, Managing Editor, books at Amazon.com. "We love these conversations so much that we wanted to share them with our customers. We hope that customers will take the opportunity to submit questions on our Amazon Books Facebook page or through our blog, Omnivoracious. They can also contact us at authorinterviews@amazon.com with questions for visiting authors."
The Backstory will feature Author Interviews@Amazon interviews and other exclusive author content such as guest reviews, interviews, authors' favorite playlists, recipes and more.
New author interviews will be announced via the Amazon.com Books Facebook page and on Omnivoracious.com, the Amazon.com Books blog. Customers will be able to post questions for visiting authors that will be incorporated into each interview. All edited videos will be available on the book's detail page and accessible from archives in The Backstory.
"We're extremely lucky to have fascinating and talented authors gracing our hallways here at Amazon and taking time to chat with us," said Mari Malcolm, Managing Editor, books at Amazon.com. "We love these conversations so much that we wanted to share them with our customers. We hope that customers will take the opportunity to submit questions on our Amazon Books Facebook page or through our blog, Omnivoracious. They can also contact us at authorinterviews@amazon.com with questions for visiting authors."
The Backstory will feature Author Interviews@Amazon interviews and other exclusive author content such as guest reviews, interviews, authors' favorite playlists, recipes and more.
Sunday, April 24, 2011
eReader Company Kobo Secures $50 Million to Compete with Kindle and Nook
"Kobo will use the new funding to continue its explosive growth internationally," said Greg Twinney, CFO of Kobo. "As the eReading space continues to heat up, Kobo is committed to providing an innovative experience that lets consumers read anytime, anyplace and share their love of reading with friends."
Kobo kicked off its European expansion last week, with the announcement of its plans to launch local content stores inGermany -- the largest book market outside of the US -- and Spain starting in May 2011. Local stores for France, Italy and the Netherlands will follow this summer -- an industry first. In providing local content and reading experiences for European readers, Kobo continues to build on the vision of giving people around the world the freedom to read on any device, and share their love of reading with friends.
Starting today, consumers can buy the highly anticipated BlackBerry PlayBook which comes pre-loaded with the Kobo eReading app -- in leading retailers across the US and Canada. RIM selected Kobo as its strategic eReading partner, given its ability to service customers around the globe.
The Kobo eReading app delivers a personalized reading experience and allows users to choose the perfect text size and style, select between day and night mode, both featuring uninterrupted reading with seamless page turns and chapter transitions. Plus, readers can switch between single or side-by-side page view simply in landscape orientation or simply rotate the Playbook to read in portrait orientation. Kobo is offering a free copy of Thomas Cleary's translation of The Art of War exclusively to BlackBerry PlayBook customers. Users can sign in or create their Kobo account from the BlackBerry PlayBook and the free eBook will be added directly to their library.
Since Kobo's launch in December 2009, Kobo has:
- One of the largest stores worldwide: over 2.3 million eBooks, newspapers and magazines with titles ranging from the NYT bestseller list, the hottest new releases, thrillers, romance and over a million free books -- Kobo has built one of the largest stores in the world.
- Over 3.2 million Users: with over 1 million users added in the last 90 days
- An Open Platform: Kobo is dedicated to an open cloud-based platform, enabling users build their lifetime library, and access it from any device.
- A leading eReader: Kobo has developed and launched two industry leading eReaders; the Kobo eReader and the Kobo Wireless eReader.
- Top ranked eReading applications; for iPad, iPhone, Blackberry, Android, Palm WebOS, Windows, MacOS
- Localised Stores: Kobo already offers locally merchandised English language stores in the US, Canada, UK, Australia,New Zealand and Hong Kong -- with Germany and Spain launching in May, and France, Italy and the Netherlandslaunching this summer.
- Leading Tablet Partners; including Samsung, Research In Motion and HTC have chosen Kobo as their global eReading platform for their mobile devices.
- Leading Retail Partners; including Indigo (Canada), Best Buy (US & Canada), Borders (US), Walmart (US & Canada) Angus & Robertsons (AU), Whitcoull's (NZ), WHSmith (UK), Swindon (Hong Kong)
- The Most Comprehensive Social eReading Experience -- Kobo's Reading Life; an industry-first social experience that enables passionate readers to connect with friends to discuss their favourite books on Facebook, build their Reading Life, and earn awards -- just for reading.
Sunday, April 17, 2011
Free Digital Publishing for the iPad
Thanks to the Apple iPad and new tools like iBuildApp.com, digital publishing is easier than ever. Silicon Valley based startup iBuildApp recently added an iPad publishing solution to their suite of iPhone templates designed for the non-coder.
iPad publishing has created new revenue streams for businesses who can publish materials without printing and shipping costs. Create your own iPad magazine, catalog, or book app. iBuildApp solution has templates, is automated, and totally free to create and update. See it here: http://ibuildapp.com/ipad_self_publishing/.
The solution also delivers a good experience for the reader. "We believe that a digital magazine or newspaper should feel like a media app, not like a magazine reader," said Rafael Soultanov. When someone swipes from page to page they can choose different stories to read. Images are vivid, video is optimized. If a reader wants to comment or share what they're reading, they just tap a button.
The fully functional publishing app takes just 2-3 hours to create and publish content. Just copy/paste content into our pre-made templates for the iPad, for free. The iBuildApp iPad solution will be integrated with other CMS platforms such as Wordpress, Drupal and Joomla. It simply requires snippets of code from iBuildApp to be inserted into the CMS code.
Services make it less complicated for authors to publish and manage their own publishing (magazines and books). By using a service, publishers can focus on their content and leave the formatting, publishing and distribution to iBuildapp. Unlike other services iBuildApp Self-Publishing Solution provides authors with a free online editor, free formatting and design templates and integrated publishing for iPad and Web.
iPad publishing has created new revenue streams for businesses who can publish materials without printing and shipping costs. Create your own iPad magazine, catalog, or book app. iBuildApp solution has templates, is automated, and totally free to create and update. See it here: http://ibuildapp.com/ipad_self_publishing/.
The solution also delivers a good experience for the reader. "We believe that a digital magazine or newspaper should feel like a media app, not like a magazine reader," said Rafael Soultanov. When someone swipes from page to page they can choose different stories to read. Images are vivid, video is optimized. If a reader wants to comment or share what they're reading, they just tap a button.
The fully functional publishing app takes just 2-3 hours to create and publish content. Just copy/paste content into our pre-made templates for the iPad, for free. The iBuildApp iPad solution will be integrated with other CMS platforms such as Wordpress, Drupal and Joomla. It simply requires snippets of code from iBuildApp to be inserted into the CMS code.
Services make it less complicated for authors to publish and manage their own publishing (magazines and books). By using a service, publishers can focus on their content and leave the formatting, publishing and distribution to iBuildapp. Unlike other services iBuildApp Self-Publishing Solution provides authors with a free online editor, free formatting and design templates and integrated publishing for iPad and Web.
Hannover House Sets New E-Book Royalty Standards and Initial Releases
In the wake of continuing debate between publishers and authors regarding the establishment of fair and reasonable royalty rates for the emerging E-Book platforms, Hannover House (http://hannoverhouse.com/index.php ) has announced a new standard rate of thirty percent of E-Book net revenues for authors. This new rate for all Hannover House authors surpasses the current industry standard of twenty-five percent E-Book royalties being offered by most major publishers.
Initial E-Book releases from Hannover House will launch in June, and include two non-fiction titles from author Barr McClellan, and two fiction thrillers from author Vivian Schilling. McClellan's "Made in the USA" was published in hardcover format in March of 2010, and his New York Times Bestseller, "Blood, Money and Power: How LBJ Killed JFK," was originally published in September 2003. Schilling's acclaimed thriller "Quietus" was originally released in hardcover format in January 2002, and her debut thriller "Sacred Prey" was originally published in September 1994. Both "Blood, Money and Power" and "Quietus" have sold more than 100,000 units each in various print formats, and are expected to be significant sellers again once released on the various E-Book platforms.
"It was important for Hannover House to make a statement that we stand with our authors in support of fair and reasonable royalties for new media formats," said Eric Parkinson, C.E.O. of Hannover House. "E-Books provide publishers with greater efficiencies and lower costs of production, freight and storage, so it only makes sense that the author's share should increase, not decrease as other publishers have claimed. If we don't compensate the authors fairly for these emerging formats, the publishing industry will jeopardize the supply of quality material by removing the financial incentives for authors."
The launch of Hannover's initial E-Book titles will be promoted with ads in the New York Times Book Review, Publisher's Weekly and multiple internet sites targeted to reach avid readers.
"These royalty rates will not jeopardize the profitability of our publishing division," said Parkinson. "We believe that paying a fair royalty will build author loyalty as well as encourage other, established authors to consider Hannover House for their future publishing needs."
In other news, Hannover House announced the creation of the new position of "Publisher - Editor" to administer all acquisition and release activities for the company's book division. A search for qualified candidates has commenced, with the goal of having this key managerial post in place prior to the Book Expo America convention in late May. Hannover House book titles are available through most major book retailers, including Barnes and Noble, Borders Group, Hudson Group, Books-A-Million, Hastings and all major internet book selling sites.
Initial E-Book releases from Hannover House will launch in June, and include two non-fiction titles from author Barr McClellan, and two fiction thrillers from author Vivian Schilling. McClellan's "Made in the USA" was published in hardcover format in March of 2010, and his New York Times Bestseller, "Blood, Money and Power: How LBJ Killed JFK," was originally published in September 2003. Schilling's acclaimed thriller "Quietus" was originally released in hardcover format in January 2002, and her debut thriller "Sacred Prey" was originally published in September 1994. Both "Blood, Money and Power" and "Quietus" have sold more than 100,000 units each in various print formats, and are expected to be significant sellers again once released on the various E-Book platforms.
"It was important for Hannover House to make a statement that we stand with our authors in support of fair and reasonable royalties for new media formats," said Eric Parkinson, C.E.O. of Hannover House. "E-Books provide publishers with greater efficiencies and lower costs of production, freight and storage, so it only makes sense that the author's share should increase, not decrease as other publishers have claimed. If we don't compensate the authors fairly for these emerging formats, the publishing industry will jeopardize the supply of quality material by removing the financial incentives for authors."
The launch of Hannover's initial E-Book titles will be promoted with ads in the New York Times Book Review, Publisher's Weekly and multiple internet sites targeted to reach avid readers.
"These royalty rates will not jeopardize the profitability of our publishing division," said Parkinson. "We believe that paying a fair royalty will build author loyalty as well as encourage other, established authors to consider Hannover House for their future publishing needs."
In other news, Hannover House announced the creation of the new position of "Publisher - Editor" to administer all acquisition and release activities for the company's book division. A search for qualified candidates has commenced, with the goal of having this key managerial post in place prior to the Book Expo America convention in late May. Hannover House book titles are available through most major book retailers, including Barnes and Noble, Borders Group, Hudson Group, Books-A-Million, Hastings and all major internet book selling sites.
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