More information on the potential sale of Germany’s Weltbild, which a colleague there calls “the biggest fish to come on to the market” in some time, with sales of approximately 2 billion euros a year, and a market value estimated at about 1 billion euros a year. Holtzbrinck is already a 50-percent owner of Weltbild’s publishing company Droemer and is thought to be interested primarily in that piece of the empire. Separately, Weltbild is a 50-percent partner with Hugendubel in a holding company that operates multiple bookstore chains, including Hugendubel, Weltbild plus and Jokers, and most recently, they took over […]
Harlequin's "Enriched" eBooks
Harlequin has announced the launch of what they call “enriched editions”: ebooks containing “interactive buttons that hyperlink to Web sites containing photos, historical commentaries, illustrations, sound effects, maps, articles and more, bringing the world of the novel to life without the reader having to leave the computer or the current screen page.”Press release
Carnegie Mellon's Entertainment Technology Center Starts Lulu.com "Imprint"
The university has announced ECW Press, an academic imprint designed to experiment with “flexibility in publishing without the limitations encountered by traditional publishing.” They note in the release that “all ETC Press publications will be released under a Creative Commons license, and will also have associated websites to encourage and enable a community of collaborative authorship and discussion.” Lulu.com is their technology partner, providing print-on-demand along with downloads. The press can be found at http://etc.cmu.edu/etcpress/Release
Personnel News
At Goldberg McDuffie Communications, Kathleen Carter has been promoted to senior publicist and Liza Lucas has been promoted to publicist. In the UK, David & Charles has named Stephen Bateman as managing director and publisher, starting in mid-August. He has been working for France, and set up DK’s children’s division there. David & Charles’ UK operation has previously been run out of F+W’s US office.
Zell Aide on Book Pages
“Heard a conversation about how Book reporting doesn’t generate revenue and may have to go away. WAIT! Maybe Book reviews and coverage are one of those things that don’t generate revenue right now, BUT–are trademarks for newspapers and elicit high passion from readers. At XM, we had Opera channels. Low listenership…HIGH passion…AND–it was one of those things that even if people didn’t listen or even like Opera, it was one of those things you had to have for completeness. Maybe Book sections in newspapers are just dated. Not the idea…but the look and feel. Maybe they’re modeled after a book […]
Softplay Buys Kidsbooks
Privately-owned Chicago-based Softplay, a marketer of interactive books and related toys, has purchased Boston children’s book publisher Kidsbooks, on undisclosed terms. Playthings