Audible filed their reply to publishers’ request for a preliminary injunction blocking the release of the Captions feature on their work, and the company used the same arguments to file a separate motion to dismiss the case entirely. Of course if Audible actually means what they have been writing to self-published authors and independent publishers — that they “have chosen to wait until the outcome of the proceeding to release” the feature — they could save the court some effort and so stipulate as a legal promise, which would make rendering a verdict on a restraining order unnecessary. That would […]
Archives for September 2019
ALA Starts Anti-Macmillan Petition, Continues to Give Amazon A Free Pass
The American Library Association has launched a petition in which Macmillan is urged to reconsider the company’s planned eight-week windowing of all but one copy of new-release ebooks to libraries. “ALA’s goal is to send a clear message to Macmillan’s CEO John Sargent: e-book access should be neither denied nor delayed,” said ALA Executive Director Mary Ghikas in the release. We asked the ALA when they would focus their earnest efforts on the largest publisher — and indeed the largest corporation — that does outright deny patrons any access, ever, to their ebooks or digital audiobooks. That would be Amazon, […]
Co-Owner of One Book Culture Store Says They Don’t Need Customer Loans
Harper’s publisher John “Rick” MacArthur, who owns 40 percent of the Book Culture bookstore on Columbus Avenue in NYC, is concerned that partner Chris Doeblin — who operates the three other Book Culture stores under a different entity — is “raising money on the false premise that Book Culture on Columbus is on the verge of failure when it’s not. I won’t permit it to go bankrupt.” Doeblin had posted in late June “Our 4 stores are in danger of closing soon and we need financial assistance or investment on an interim basis to help us find our footing.” An […]
People, Etc.
Edmund White will receive the National Book Foundation’s 2019 Medal for Distinguished Contribution to American Letters. Filmmaker John Waters will present the award at the National Book Awards ceremony on November 20.White’s best known work include A Boy’s Own Story and The Beautiful Room. NBF executive director Lisa Lucas said in a statement. “It’s only when you’re able to look back at a body of work that one is able to see a career like Edmund White’s for what it is: revolutionary and vital, making legible for scores of readers the people, moments and history that would come to define […]
People, Etc.
Allison Carroll has joined Audible Originals as executive editor for romance. She was previously editor at Harlequin. Molly Fletcher has been promoted to digital marketing specialist at Sourcebooks. Ruth Reichl remembers her editor Susan Kamil in the NYT, and Michelle Willens remembers her friend James Atlas in the LAT. Bookselling San Francisco’s Green Apple Books is buying Browser Books on Fillmore Street as of October 1. The store will keep its name and its staff.
Legal: More On Captions, and Fox, As EU Is Advised Against Resale of eBooks
Last week when we reported that Audible was telling self-published ACX authors “we have chosen to wait until the outcome of the proceeding to release” their controversial Captions feature, the company said this was “what we’re communicating to authors” and declined to answer our question about whether that policy applied to publishers as well. The Independent Book Publishers Association complained to Audible about Captions on behalf of 27 of their members, and got the exact same form e-mail response back that we quoted last week, Publishing Perspectives reports. Which suggests the entire launch, aside from public domain titles, has been […]