LibraryThing is among booklover sites with loyal audiences that has had success in helping publishers channel galleys to interested readers who are likely to post online/review the books. In October, for example, they’ve had available for request 1,670 copies of 55 titles. Now Sourcebooks is experimenting with an electronic offering: they are allowing up to 2,500 downloads of their recently published IN THE LAND OF INVISIBLE WOMEN to Library Thing members through the end of October.
eNews
Oprah's "Favorite New Gadget": Kindle
She loved the Gemstar ebook reader back when it was hard to love in 2000 (and even that didn’t spur sales significantly) and now Oprah loves Kindle. She gave the device an oddly over-the-top endorsement on Friday’s show, with Amazon ceo Jeff Bezos joining her on the set as window dressing since he barely got a word in. Winfrey declared, “I’m telling you, it is absolutely my new favorite thing in the world.” Acknowledging that the device could be pricey for much of her audience, the Oprah web site has a promotional code that gives $50 off the purchase price […]
E and Free
Open-source college textbook company Flat World Knowledge announced the completion of $700,000 funding round, bringing total funding to date to $1.4 million. They say they expect “a larger Series A round from venture investors and/or strategic partners within the next six months.” In beta for the past few months, Flat World expects to have its national commercial launch in time for the 2009 spring semester. They are building their sales and marketing team, which now includes Sharon Koch as marketing director. (She was director of marketing for a division of Prentice Hall/Pearson Education.) And former Simon & Schuster ceo Jonathan […]
People, and More
At Random House Canada, Lisa Charters has been promoted to svp, director, digital, continuing to report to president Brad Martin. The company’s BookLounge.ca, a site for “avid readers,” is said to have over 10,000 members. Charters is “also now leading our efforts to get our books into Ebook format and focusing on the increasing sales opportunities for digital downloadable ebooks and audiobooks.” Also electronically, Random House UK is developing a site called AuthorsPlace that gives the house’s authors a toolkit to create pages online with a variety of standardize content elements. At the site, the company says: “We’ve invited our […]
Penguin Gets Widgety
Penguin Group will use Ingram Digital for the hosting, management and distribution of ebook and downloadable audiobook titles in the US, UK and Canada. They say that Ingram will host and distribute “approximately 11,000 titles, with many more slated to be added in 2009,” including the fulfillment of titles for Penguin’s US and UK web sites. As of next year, “many titles will also be available to retailers through Ingram Digital’s Search and Discover services.”
Google Bits
Google Book Search’s head of partnerships for Europe Santiago de la Mora, as the company says they now have 20,000 publishing partners around the world: “But let’s be clear on the record that Google’s not going to launch an ereader or something like that.” He would not update the number of books scanned and available online: “The figure has not been changed. That’s [over a million books] the official number. It’s more than the figures. Let’s not get bogged down.” It sure is. As we noted earlier this week, the newly-formed Hathi Trust, seemingly not very much on the radar […]