Sony‘s deputy president for the Digital Reading Business Division Fujio Noguchi pretends that the company remains serious about the ebook business, telling an Asian tech web site, “We are aiming to acquire a share of 40% in the global electronic book market in fiscal 2012.” (The site mistakenly believes that Sony has been “leading” the US ebook market along with Amazon….) The company is looking to develop reading-focused color epaper screens: “I believe that color e-paper should be employed for e-book readers with a focus on displaying texts. So, we are sending such requests to e-paper device makers.” The LAT […]
Larsson Sells 115,000 eBooks On Christmas and Day After
After Amazon reported that THE GIRL WITH THE DRAGON TATTOO was their biggest-selling ebook on December 25 and most-gifted holiday ebook, Random House has said that on December 25 and 26, they sold 115,000 units of Stieg Larsson ebooks across the entire Millennium Trilogy. The company indicated their total ebook sales for that two-day holiday period “rose more than 300% over last year’s sales” (measured in units) setting a new two-day record. (Some executives expressed disappointment to us that early statistics for Christmas Day ebook sales weren’t higher still, since ebook sales have been running about three times last year’s sales throughout […]
Skyhorse Buys Sports Publishing Assets, Prepares Children’s List
Skyhorse Publishing has purchased the assets of Sports Publishing, which went bankrupt in 2008. That gives them rights to over 700 books, including works by Michael Phelps and Dick Vitale. They will relaunch Sports Publishing as a new imprint with 40 revised and updated titles in fall 2011. In the same season, the company will launch a new children’s imprint, Sky Pony Press. They expect to start with 15 to 20 titles. Former publisher and founder of Millbrook Press Jean Reynolds is serving as consulting editor. The company says sales for 2010 were up more than 60 percent over 2009.
Amazon’s New Kindle/Holiday Press Release
The etailer released their traditional post-Christmas non-statistics. Reaching for new non-specific superlatives about Kindle sales, they say the new model is “the bestselling product in Amazon’s history, eclipsing Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows (Book 7).” We don’t know final sales for the book by the company, but on October 24, 2007 they reported sales of 2.5 million copies worldwide, calling it their “largest new product release.” In today’s release ceo Jeff Bezos acknowledges the even bigger sales of tablets, insisting in a defensive way that “sustomers report using their LCD tablets for games, movies, and web browsing and their […]
WikiLeaks Assange Is Writing to Raise Funds
WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange claims he had to sell a memoir to raise funds to defend himself, telling the Times of London, “I don’t want to write this book, but I have to. I have already spent [more than $300,000] for legal costs, and I need to defend myself and keep WikiLeaks afloat.” Did anyone tell him how long it was going to take collect his advance? Assange says Knopf is paying about $800,000 and Canongate is paying him approximately $500,000. He estimates that money from serialization and other territories will add another few hundred thousand dollars, though again its […]
Nashville GLBT OutLoud Bookstore Is Closing; Some POD Bestsellers
OutLoud founders Ted Jensen and Kevin Medley announced they will start liquidating inventory and close their store after 15 years in business. The Tennessean says “they alluded to reasons for closing such as high interest rates that small businesses can’t afford, lack of meaningful legislation that would help small businesses and the unfair advantages chain stores have over the small, locally owned ones.” Tennessean When the Museum of Art in Fort Lauderdale finishes a renovation in January, they will feature a new boutique run by Miami’s Books & Books. Owner Mitchell Kaplan says “there are terrific people to partner with…. […]