In Wiley’s aggressive legal campaign against individuals they allege shared copies of various “For Dummies” books in violation of their copyright via BitTorrent, the company recently named a few of the previously anonymous defendants and asked for a jury trial. TorrentFreak observes that “if one or more of the three cases indeed proceeds to a full trial it will be the first time that actual evidence against BitTorrent infringers is tested in court.” Wiley attorney William Dunnegan tells the BBC: “We are asking people who are identified by their ISPs as being copyright infringers to pay the minimum amount due […]
People
Tina Andreadis has been promoted to vp, senior executive director of publicity for Harper, Ecco, Amistad, Harper Perennial, Harper paperbacks, Harper Audio, and, effective immediately, It Books, and Harper Design. At Viking Penguin, Meghan Fallon has been promoted to publicist, and Rebecca Lang and Elaine Broeder both move up to associate publicist. Todd Mullins has been named national accounts manager, special markets at Chronicle Books. Previously he was vp, sales at Hero Arts. Adding to the voices on the Pulitzer Prize controversy is fiction judge Maureen Corrigan. Writing in the Washington Post, she says: “Like everyone else, we three jurors […]
Judge Sets Hearing on DOJ Settlements for July 27 as Hachette and Harper Near Settlement With 50 States
At a status conference Wednesday afternoon in New York District Court, Judge Denise Cote heard from lawyers representing Apple, contesting publishers Penguin and Macmillan, and the three publishers – Hachette, Simon & Schuster, and HarperCollins — that settled with the Department of Justice and are working towards a similar outcome with as many as all 50 states. Hachette and Harper confirmed they signed a memorandum of understanding with 16 states and Puerto Rico, Bloomberg reported, and “they hope to have a settlement with all 50 states completed by June 11,” exactly 60 days from when both the DOJ and state […]
People, Etc.
Jennifer LaBracio has joined Little, Brown Books for Young Readers as associate director of marketing. She was most recently senior marketing manager at HMH Children’s. At HarperCollins UK, Erin Roy has joined as marketing communications director and Rufus Weston has been named customer insight director. Roy was most recently associate publisher at IPC Media and Weston was previously head of digital insight at the BBC global news division. Bookmasters will distribute Pearson Mexico‘s educational titles into the US and Canada. Digital book manufacturer IBT Global has acquired Castleton, NY-based printer Hamilton Printing Company. Terms of the deal were not disclosed, […]
Amazon Publishing Gets North American Rights to James Bond Backlist
When Curtis Brown UK managing director Jonny Geller announced that Jonathan Cape had acquired a ten-year license to republish Ian Fleming’s James Bond backlist in the UK, he intimated there would be a new North American publisher in the works as well. As was announced Tuesday afternoon, that publisher is Amazon, through its Thomas & Mercer imprint, which will reissue the 14 Bond novels, as well as two non-fiction titles by Fleming, The Diamond Smugglers (1957) and Thrilling Cities (1963), in ebook and print formats starting this summer. (Penguin previously held world English rights to the Bond novels, but their […]
Supreme Court Will Hear Case On Importing Foreign Textbooks Into US
On Monday the Supreme Court announced it would hear the case pitting USC doctoral candidate in mathematics Supap Kirtsaeng against Wiley for importing textbooks from his native Thailand into the United States. Assuming the Court actually comes to clear ruling, it will have broad ramifications for the publishing community. Just two years ago the court deadlocked 4-4 on a similar, but less directly publishing-related, case, Costco vs. Omega, allowing an appeals court decision in favor of Omega (and by extension, publishers) to stand. Wiley’s original 2008 suit charged that Kirtsaeng violated Wiley’s copyright by importing between $900,000 and $1.2 million […]