With two international announcements this week and more a possibility at next week’s Frankfurt Book Fair, we’ve prepared a recap of recent international expansions of the big ebookstore platforms: Amazon launched their first non-English Kindle store in Germany in April. As part of their international expansion, the company added a general Amazon store in Spain last month (and they opened a general store in Italy in November 2010). Kindle stores are expected soon in both Spain and Italy, where advertisements have been seen for Kindle positions. Among other countries on Amazon’s horizon, Brazilian publishers have reported discussions for both a […]
International News
Google eBooks Launch in the UK; Weltbild Adds German Readers
We’re glad we won’t have to spend the early days of the Frankfurt Book Fair wondering when Google will launch their long-expected UK ebookstore: it is live now. It looks just like the US version, except when visited from US IP addresses you mostly see blank carousels, so there is not a lot to check out. (We infer the store is IP restricted, since UK visitors report seeing a regular store display.) Strategic partner development manager Jason Hanley told The Bookseller, which has the first story on the store, that the Australian and Canadian versions will launch “soon.” As announced […]
Did European Court Just Block Open-Market Imports?
A European Court of Justice ruling in a case over an English pub owner who used a Greek decoder to let her access less expensive Greek broadcasts of Premier League soccer games may have an unusual application: It could settle once and for all the disagreements between US and UK publishers over how to handle open-market English-language exports into continental Europe. That’s because the ruling appears to limit territorial rights limitations within Europe. As interpreted by attorney C.E. Petit on his blog Scrivener’s Error, the court has said that “an identical work can essentially only be licensed once for redistribution […]
Lonely Planet Founders Buy Canongate’s Stake in Text Publishing
Founders of Lonely Planet Maureen and Tony Wheeler have bought Canongate’s stake in Text Publishing for an undisclosed sum. Michael Heyward and Penny Hueston, who bought Text in tandem with Canongate in 2004 and created a joint venture whereby Text also published Canongate titles in Australia, will retain their share in the company and Heyward will stay on as publisher and managing director. Heyward added that Text and Canongate “will continue to work closely together to acquire books and authors.” “Our decision to sell our stake in Text was a strategic one that will enable us to focus more of our […]
Julian Assange WikiLeaks Canongate
It will come as no great surprise that Julian Assange has released correspondence with Canongate and purported transcripts of apparently-taped phone calls with Canongate publisher Jamie Byng. Though Canongate published the unauthorized draft in part due to admitted “financial imperative,” according to an email from Assange’s agent Caroline Michel, by going ahead with publication, Canongate now is obligated to pay Assange, “in accordance with the agreement, the remaining amounts of £225,000 on delivery of the complete manuscript and £175,000 on first UK publication.” (That should provide enough to pay back Knopf and still leave some for Assange.) As we noted […]
People: Sevier Promoted to EIC at Dutton, Rinaldi Leaves Rodale, and More
Ben Sevier has been promoted to editor-in-chief at Dutton, effective Octboer 3. He has been there for almost five years. President and publisher Brian Tart says, “I know from both authors and agents how much of an advocate Ben is for his writers. He gets the best out of them, every time. He believes in the power of a good story and he finds innovative ways to reach the widest possible audience for each of his books. I can’t think of a better person to lead our editorial efforts than Ben Sevier.” Rodale evp and general manager of the books […]