A packed London Book Fair panel today gathered today four UK-based big houses ceos: John Makinson from Penguin, Tim Hely-Hutchinson from Hachette UK; Gail Rebuck from Random House UK; and Victorian Barnsley from Harper UK; each expressing varying degrees of the requisite “enthusiasm” about digital opportunities current and future. True to form Hely-Hutchinson remains the most cautious member of this group: ebooks “will have a place in the market, but its not the end of the story.” (He sees ebooks as only 5 percent of the market in five years.) He warned that it would be “very foolish to be […]
International News
Penguin International Deals Include Chinese eBook Partner
True to the international spirit of the London Book Fair, Penguin made multiple announcements at a press briefing this morning related to its far-flung English-language empire. Starting in May, they will issue the full range of digitized Penguin UK and Dorling Kindersley titles (now comprising over 2,000 books) as ebooks in China with Beijing-based partner Founder Apabi Group in the company’s proprietary format. Founder Apabi is save to have an estimated 80 percent share of the ebook market, with over 500,000 tiles from Chinese publishers. Approximately 80 percent of the market is in library sales, with consumers comprising the remainder, […]
Harper Has Tolkien eRights Worldwide
Harper Collins UK, which publishes JRR Tolkien, has acquired worldwide electronic rights to the authors work. Six titles are available today for direct download, including The Hobbit, the Lord of the Rings, and The Children of Hurin, followed by The Legend of Sigurd and Gudrún, The Silmarillion and Unfinished Tales on May 5, “with further titles later in the year.”Harper UK is selling epub files directly from their site, served by technology partner Overdrive, with files also available Waterstone’s. In the US, the books are available in multiple formats, serving all major devices and platforms. And Harper says that the […]
Random UK "Enhances" eBooks
Under the Banner of Book and Beyond, Random House UK is launching enhanced ebooks with “a range of additional content such as videos, games, quizzes, photos, author interviews, interactive graphics and the option to listen to or read the text at the start of each chapter.” (In other words, they do not work on current dedicated ereaders, running Adobe Digital Editions, but are fine on computers–but then there are very few ereaders in consumers hands in the UK anyway.) The first ten titles include Nothing to Lose by Lee Child (with a digital graphic novel); The Book Thief by Markus […]
Bloomsbury UK to Offer Their Own Online Library
While much of the industry is transfixed by the looming court decision on the Google Book Search settlement (and the complexities thereof), Bloomsbury UK is moving forward with a electronic lending library of its own. Working with Exact Editions and launching on May 5, the Bloomsbury Library Online will “allow readers to read collections of bestselling books at local library terminals or with the use of a library card on home computers and internet enabled devices.” The publisher is selling the service as an annual subscription to libraries, priced according to the “size of population served.” Bloomsbury Executive Director Richard […]
Bloomsbury UK Removes Prices from Backlist, and Retailers Are Surprised
Bloomsbury has been removing printed prices from backlist titles in the UK starting “over a year” ago, Richard Charkin tells the Bookseller. He adds, “When something drops into the backlist, you may wish to increase the price, in which case this enables us to do it [more easily]. It’s a sensible thing to do because I think this government is going to have to introduce high levels of inflation, and we want to make sure we have a way of dealing with it.” But all retailers surveyed by the magazine have been taken by surprise by the move. Borders UK […]