For readers who like mainstream ebooks more than discounted House Brand titles, the number two ebookseller has relaunched their store and reading app. “Apple Books” represents a major redesign, launched yesterday in 51 countries as part of Apple’s new iOS12 release. The company now incorporates audiobooks within the books app (and Book Store), though they…
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New Accounting Rules Will Likely Lift Penguin Random House’s Sales: It’s A Long Story
On Thursday Penguin Random House’s parent company Bertelsmann will be the last of the big companies to report financial results through June 30, and when that happens, there will be something different about PRH’s results. The company will use a different accounting method for their ebook sales, making their overall sales for the past six…
Walmart eBooks, Kobo Integrates OverDrive, NYPL’s Instagram Books
As we previewed on Tuesday, today is the official launch day for Walmart ebooks (including digital audiobooks as well), in partnership with Rakuten Kobo. In separate news, Kobo has added “one-touch public library lending” to all of their ereading devices, for libraries that use Rakuten’s OverDrive. Kobo ceo Michael Tamblyn says in the announcement, “The insights…
Walmart Readies eBook Rollout
Walmart is preparing to launch their retail partnership with Kobo ebooks, audiobooks and devices, announced in January. One Texas MobileRead user took pictures of in-store fixtures as they were being installed. Walmart stores will sell Kobo ereading devices, along with cards redeemable for ebooks, and audiobook subscriptions. Walmart’s website features ebooks help pages now, and Kobo…
Tor Tests Windowing Frontlist Library eBooks, Joins Broader Library Impact Data Study
Tor Books has begun windowing ebook versions of frontlist titles (e.g. the adult science line) for the library market starting with July releases, delaying their availability for library ebook distribution to four months after the retail on-sale date. The company told libraries this is “part of a test program to determine the impact of eLending…
Briefs: Bloomsbury In Line with Expectations, Atavist Was Sold
Bloomsbury issued a brief trading update on the first four months of their fiscal year, through June 30, still “in line with its expectations” for the year. Sales were up 3.7 percent with the recently-acquired IB Tauris — and 2.1 percent without two months of Tauris’s sales. The company said they had “a particularly strong…