In a brief five-page ruling, the 2nd Circuit Court of Appeals vacated Judge Denny Chin’s June 2012 certification of the Authors Guild as a class in the long-running Google Books lawsuit, which itself was a repeat of the original 2005 class certification. The appeals court concluded that class certification “was premature in the absence of a determination by the District Court of the merits of Google’s ‘fair use’ defense.” They also opined that “Google’s claim that plaintiffs are not representative of the certified class” is “an argument which, in our view, may carry some force.” So the actual issues of […]
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The ALA’s Carnegie Medals went to Richard Ford‘s CANADA for fiction and Timothy Egan‘s SHORT NIGHTS OF THE SHADOW CATCHER for nonfiction. Nicole Russo has been hired as director, children’s marketing and publicity for Abrams Children’s, Amulet, and Appleseed. Previously she was deputy director of publicity at Simon & Schuster Children’s. In addition, Paul Colarusso has been named marketing manager for the adult trade division. Previously he was a marketing manager at the Aperture Foundation. The new Atria imprint that Dawn Davis will run will be named 37 Ink (for the 37th parallel north).
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Candice Vallimont recently joined Chronicle Books as distribution account client manager. Previously she was a product manager at Hachette New Zealand. In the UK, Laura Hassan has been named editorial director of Guardian Faber, the new nonfiction imprint created by Faber and the newspaper, effective August 5. She is currently editorial director at Vintage Classics UK. At Harlequin, Beth Attwood will join the company as managing editor coordinator, New York/Toronto on July 2. In the UK, Pippa Roscoe has been promoted to acting assistant editor, Modern/Presents; Laurie Johnson has been promoted to assistant editor; and Megan Haslam has been promoted […]
Penguin Asks Judge Cote to Dismiss Class Action-Seeking Lawsuit Against Author Solutions
Just one day after wrapping up the Apple ebook price fixing trial, Judge Cote is in the midst of a different publishing industry-related lawsuit. Last Friday Penguin filed a motion to dismiss a class action-seeking lawsuit filed on April 26 by three authors against Author Solutions, which Penguin acquired in July 2012. In the motion, Penguin alleges the lawsuit from three ASI customers — Jodi Foster, Kelvin James, and Terry Hardy — was a “misguided attempt to make a federal class action out of a series of gripes by two of them about alleged typographical and formatting errors and supposed […]
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Sandi Kirshner has been named chief marketing officer at Cengage, working out of the company’s Boston office. Previously she was evp, higher education policy at Pearson. Quarto has entered into a number of distribution agreements with Hachette UK and US for several of its imprints. Quayside Publishing Group will be distributed by Hachette US effective January 1, 2014, and Hachette UK subsidiary Littlehampton Book Services as of July 1. Littlehampton will also distribute Aurum Publishing Group titles as of September.
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Knopf Doubleday has announced a number of promotions in the division’s publicity department. Michiko Clark has been promoted to director of publicity, Pantheon & Schocken, while Michelle Somers moves up to associate director of publicity. Josie Kals has been promoted to publicity manager, Knopf & Pantheon, while also taking on added responsibility for the division’s poetry program. Elizabeth Lindsay and Erica Hinsley both move up to publicist, while Erinn McGrath has been promoted to associate publicist. Separately, Sara Eagle has been named marketing manager, effective July 8, having most recently been a senior publicist, and Lena Khidritsaya is leaving the […]