In Tuesday’s conference call with investors, Barnes & Noble ceo William Lynch tried explaining the decline in digital content growth a couple of different ways, which are not obviously consistent with each other. On the one hand, per our reporting, publishers reported “a bit of a deceleration of the growth overall in the e-book market [more than a bit, actually] which was to be expected.” On the other hand, Lynch underscores that digital content growth is heavily dependent on new device owners filling up titles: “consumers fill up their lockers and those first two to three months are vital as […]
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Amazon Launches Kindle Store in India
Amazon officially launched its Kindle store in India Wednesday, which will include more than 1 million titles and Kindle Direct Publishing options for authors. Amazon will also sell the bare-bones version of its Kindle devices for R6,999 at Croma retail stores across India. “We are proud to launch this new Kindle store for Indian customers – offering Kindle book purchases in rupees and the ability to buy and read the work of many great Indian authors,” vp Kindle Content Russ Grandinetti said in the release. “In addition, we are excited to work with Croma to make Kindle available at retail […]
People, Etc.: Macmillan’s New Children’s Publishing Venture in China
Macmillan and 21st Century Publishing House have joined forces on a new children’s publishing venture in China, Macmillan Century Consulting & Service Company Ltd. The new venture will acquire, develop, introduce and promote children’s titles sourced from Macmillan’s publishing companies and imprints around the world, and will be led by 21st Century Publishing president Zhang Qiulin and Macmillan managing director for Greater China Charlotte Liu. “We believe Macmillan Century is in a unique position at the outset, as it has the advantage of combining Macmillan’s carefully selected children’s classics and bestsellers with 21st Century’s strong distribution channels within the Chinese […]
Barnes & Noble Will Finally Launch Nook in the UK in Mid-October
After lengthy speculation and anticipation, and in advance of announcing its first quarter earnings Tuesday morning, Barnes & Noble said they will finally launch Nook in the UK in mid-October with an online storefront as well as partnerships with “leading UK retailers” that will be announced “shortly.” (Waterstones, of course, was long expected to be partnering with Nook, but in the end allied with Amazon instead.) Nook UK will first sell the company’s Simple Touch and Simple Touch with Glowlight devices, with the tablets available at an undisclosed point. The unnamed UK partners “are expected to support the Nook offering […]
Digital Book World Launches Aggregated eBook Bestseller List
Digital Book World has launched a weekly set of ebook bestseller lists that aggregates the previous full week’s sales ranking data from Amazon, Nook, Google, Kobo and Sony into an overall list of the top 25 selling books, as well as four additional top 10 lists organized by price tiers: free to $2.99, $3 to $7.99, $8 to $9.99, and $10 and up. The bestseller lists, which will appear every Monday, were developed for DBW by Iobyte Solutions and seek to address the lack of differentiation between inexpensive ebooks — either self-published or priced promotionally for a limited time — […]
eNews: Hunger Games Bestselling Series Ever At Amazon US: State Department Cancels Kindle Contract; and More
Amazon announced that THE HUNGER GAMES trilogy by Suzanne Collins is the US division’s bestselling series ever on all formats, though, as always, no sales figures were provided. (What the release doesn’t note is that those “sales” are likely spurred by Amazon’s decision to offer the Hunger Games to Prime members for free borrowing through the Kindle Owner’s Lending Library.) Earlier in the summer Amazon UK said the 50 SHADES OF GREY trilogy was its bestselling series to date. In other Amazon news, the State Department cancelled a controversial no-bid contract with Amazon pending since last June that would have […]