For the third consecutive year, at Digital Book World later this month, Jack McKeown from Verso Digital (and Books & Books Westhampton Beach) will present original consumer survey data and analysis on consumer habits regarding both ebooks and print books, from responses elicited from over 2,200 respondents after November’s “Cyber Monday.” By their results, ereader ownership could as much as double over the next year–6.4 percent of respondents are “very likely” to purchase, and another 9.9 percent are somewhat likely, with 15.8 percent of people saying they “already own” an reader. (That ownership percentage is roughly consistent with what Bowker […]
Book Fairs
Irony, Iceland and Insight from Execs Opens Frankfurt Book Fair
Ironies abound if you know where to look here in Frankfurt, where the annual Book Fair is unfolding in its usual fashion. There is the host city itself, the the banking center of Germany, which has sprouted dozens of modern skyscrapers in the past decade as the Euro zone has boomed, feeling less brash and more uncertain than ever as the world waits to see if Germany will take some of the past decade’s earnings and plow it back into supporting the economic union that made it possible. Then there is this year’s guest of honor, Iceland. They signed on […]
Covering the Coverage of Publishers Launch Frankfurt
The Bookseller’s FutureBook has multiple reports from Monday’s day-long Publishers Launch Conference. This one is more of a summary while this piece focuses on the morning’s survey of ebook adoption in multiple markets globally, and the accompanying panel discussion including executives from Italy, Germany, Brazil and China. Their third focuses on the panel with agents David Miller at Rogers, Coleridge and White; Robert Gottlieb at Trident Media; Peter Fritz at Paul & Peter Fritz and Monica Martin at MB Agency. Miller reported seeing some “slippage” negotiating digital royalties above 25 percent (including escalators): “I’ve negotiated some better rates, and publishers are […]
PLC: Bowker to Add US eBook Sales Monitoring, and International Consumer Data
At this morning’s Publishers Launch Frankfurt conference, Bowker’s Kelly Gallagher announced two important data initiatives. In the US, Bowker is rolling out PubTrack Digital, a service to track actual ebook unit sales for (and from) participating publishers. Bowker’s way of getting around the unwillingness so far from retailers to share data in a common system is to work with publisher’ own invoices for their ebook sales. They take each publisher’s own data and integrate it into their aggregated data pool. Since they are working from publishers’ billing accounts, that means the data lags the marketplace by roughly five weeks–but it […]
At PLC Frankfurt, Mondadori to Launch Translated eBooks In US, and More World Views
Some information and highlights from this morning’s Publishers Launch Conference, eBooks Go Global, in Frankfurt. One of the premises of today’s conference was an expectation the ebooks will lead to new ways of publishing more fluidly around the world. Riccardo Cavallero confirmed this in the morning’s opening panel of international trade executives in two announcements. “We’re going to launch our authors in English directly into English-speaking markets” in ebook form. “We will keep paper rights free,” so if their translations find a market, “we will able to convince some reluctant North American publishers” to take over the English rights. Cavellero […]
Two Actions Might Disrupt Frankfurt Travel
Those attending the Frankfurt Book Fair this week are faced with the possibility of two different work slowdowns that could catch you coming or going. Flights into Frankfurt are experiencing delays Monday afternoon as over 1,200 ground handling staff attend meetings discussing EU plans to increase competition among the handlers. Lufthansa said Sunday “we are actively preparing for it and hope to limit the effect on passengers as much as possible,” while warning that at least some delays are likely. The larger concern is when you’ll be able to go home. Germany’s air traffic controllers rejected a mediator’s proposal to […]