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 […]
Audio
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 […]
People, Etc.
Wendi Gu has returned to Sanford J. Greenburger Associates as agent; she spent the last two years at Janklow & Nesbit as associate agent. Sarah Phair has joined SJGA as agent after 6 years at Trident Media Group, and Edward Maxwell has been promoted to agent. Jenny Stephens has been promoted to agent at Sterling Lord Literistic. Olivia Russo will join Penguin Children’s as senior director, publicity on September 3. She was formerly publicity director, Harper Children’s. Rebecca Brewer is no longer at Ace/Berkley, and can be reached at rebeccacbr@gmail.com and Brewereditorialservices.com. Phoebe Morgan will rejoin Harper UK as editorial […]
Simon & Schuster Objects to Audible’s “Unauthorized and Brazen Infringement,” As Does AAP
Simon & Schuster spokesperson Adam Rothberg provided a response to Audible’s new initiative that shows listeners a computer-generated transcription of the text of an audiobook as they listen: “We have informed Audible that we consider its Captions program to be an unauthorized and brazen infringement of the rights of authors and publishers, and a clear violation of our terms of sale. We have therefore insisted that Audible not include in Captions any titles for which Simon & Schuster holds audio or text rights.” Separately, AAP president and ceo Maria Pallante issued a statement in which she called the new Audible […]
Publishers Respond to Audible’s Planned Infringement
The publishing community is responding with appropriate alarm to the preview of Audible Captions, a forthcoming feature that will show listeners a computer-generated transcription of the text of an audiobook as they listen. A USA Today piece mentioned just three particular in-copyright titles set to be captioned (though it says the feature “will be available on hundreds of thousands of audiobooks at launch”). Two of those are Penguin Random House titles: Michelle Obama’s BECOMING and the late Chester Himes’s A RAGE IN HARLEM (the latter is sold in audio as an Audible Studios production narrated by Samuel L. Jackson). A […]
Audible Plans to Show Text Alongside Audio
Audible is sharing details about a forthcoming initiative called Audible Captions, a new feature coming in September that will show listeners the text of a book as they listen. Calling it “captions” is rather misleading, perhaps intentionally, since they intend to “caption” the entire work. In other words, they will scroll a full ebook alongside the audiobook. But have no fear, this isn’t the actual text licensed from publishers and authors. They have gone to trouble of computer-generating a “transcription” from the audio file, “harnessing Amazon Web Services’ cloud computing infrastructure and artificial intelligence.” Audible subscribers and students will be […]