Last Monday’s Publishers Launch BEA conference was a packed day of data, insights and news (like the announcement of Tor’s DRM-free ebookstore) worth sharing, and now we have a chance to catch up a bit. At the PLC site we have posted slides from five of the presentations so far, open to all, and we’ll have some audio on the way later as well. One presentation of widespread interest was Ingram chief content officer Phil Ollila‘s new data–commissioned by Publishers Launch–analyzing how the rise of ebooks affects what is sold in physical bookstores. Ollila’s primary focus was to identify opportunities […]
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The Streams of BEA
BEA show director Steve Rosato reported very preliminary convention attendances numbers on his blog Thursday afternoon in, while arguing that “BEA is what it is.” As he explains, the basic “numbers are a given–the question will only be if we are up a few percent or down a few percent” and the numbers matter less than “the books discovered or the new contacts made.” Indeed, the show has more or less found its level over the past few years, and seems to consistently draw the same basic audience, with modest year-to-year fluctuations. The early count had almost exactly the same […]
At BEA, Chabon Describes His Portrait of “Lost Utopia”
The Thursday morning BEA breakfast featured authors Zadie Smith, J.R. Moehringer and a personal favorite, admitted “total nerd” Michael Chabon. Kirstie Alley hosted, and Jimmy Fallon provided a quick hello and book plug at the beginning. He read from his second volume of wry Thank You Notes, closing with: “Thank you, Kindle, for being able to hold over 1,400 books, but never being as good as being able to hold the real thing in my hands, you son-of-a-b–ch.” Chabon offered his “first attempt” at trying to explain how he came to write his forthcoming TELEGRAPH AVENUE, after admitting that his “truest […]
Neil Young Shares Glimpses of His “Diary”
Wednesday’s lunchtime talk between Patti Smith and Neil Young on the occasion of his upcoming book WAGING HEAVY PEACE — which he characterized as “not quite a memoir. It’s more like a diary and a projection” — was understandably a major event at BEA. As part of the wide-ranging conversation about Young’s career, how technology affected music, and the nature of memory, Smith told Young “I have read much of your book,” she said, “and one of the things I liked most about it is that there’s no barrier between the reader and you. It’s intimate. You’re talking. And it’s […]
Teicher Promises New Indie eBook Solution, Calls Again for Letters to DOJ
At the American Booksellers Association’s annual meeting at BEA, ABA chief executive Oren Teicher celebrated encouraging membership and indie sales data and reinforced that “I believe this moment in our industry is rich with promise and opportunity.” (In addition to the data we have already reported, Teicher declared that across the network of Indie Commerce stores, “gross annual sales, year-to-date over year-to-date, are up 92 percent.” And separately, ABA board vice president Steve Bercu clarified that the reported gain of 55 new full ABA members comprises 77 new locations in all.) Teicher told members “you have our strongest assurance that there […]
BEA Kicks Off with Colbert, Diaz, Kingsolver and Nesbo
Book Expo America kicked off Tuesday morning’s author breakfast with attendees lined up early to enter and offered the classic mix of humor, appreciation and creative inspiration. In a new twist, BEA is live streaming the marquee convention events, and the stream actually worked. (We have the player on the PublishersMarketplace.com home page, and you can find it on many other trade sites, as well as BEA’s own site.) Emcee Stephen Colbert was in classic form, setting the stage for “three of the world’s best authors of books other than mine.” Of his own forthcoming book AMERICA AGAIN: Re-Becoming the […]