Our Own News We have a number of new initiatives and refinements to tell you about. The first is that we have significantly improved and relaunched our Who Represents database. The new version presents about 12,500 individual representation records, and along the way implements more consistent agent and agency names, and eliminates previous duplication. As before, the search page also presents matches from a couple hundred PublishersMarketplace pages posted by agents, as well as deal database matches. (We’re now shuttling relevant data more quickly from the deal reports over to Who Represents.) To encourage and facilitate continuing improvement of the […]

As Indicated Yesterday This Lunch was rudely prepared while we were paying only partial (but continuous) attention to the speakers at today’s AAP annual meeting. Convened in NY this year (rather than the usual Washington venue), the event drew somewhere between 250 and 300 people. (In the absence of invited opening speaker Laura Bush, DisneyWars author James Stewart spoke in the morning; At the close of the conference later today, outgoing Pearson Education ceo Peter Jovanovich is scheduled to speak instead of invited speaker Karl Rove.) Due to over-stressed multi-tasking and quest for wireless access, also please excuse what are […]

Schedule Note I’ll be at the AAP meeting all day tomorrow, multi-tasking away; Lunch will be served at some point, but there’s no telling exactly when. Perseus Drops Harper Perseus will no longer distribute its books through HarperCollins, beginning September 1 in the US, and January 1 in Canada. In an uncharacteristic fashion that we’ll leave you to fully interpret on your own, the change was announced late yesterday by Harper, though Perseus has not finalized their news plans yet. (Harper spokesman Lisa Herling explains their quick release saying, “The deal has been terminated and people have been calling us […]

Von Mehren to Boost Random Trade Paper; Ebershoff Becomes Editor-at-Large Jane von Mehren is leaving her post as editor-in-chief and associate publisher of Penguin to take the new position of publisher, trade paperbacks at the Random House publishing group. Starting March 23, she will oversee lines from Ballantine, Modern Library and Random House, and will also acquire hardcovers. Group president Gina Centrello says the hire signals a desire “to expand our share of the trade paperback market.” David Ebershoff, who was publishing director for RH trade paperbacks and the Modern Library, is becoming an editor-at-large, “a position he requested in […]

Triple Problems at Penguin Pull Down Pearson Results; Weak 2005 Forecast Means $10 Mil Charge at Penguin US Following their warning to financial markets in mid-January, Pearson’s annual performance came in at the low end of expectations, and profits fell 6 percent overall, reflecting a triple whammy: the weak dollar, the Penguin UK warehouse mess, and a striking decline for Penguin in the US in the second half of the year. Penguin sales fell 6.5 percent (though the company calls it flat after accounting for currency fluctuations), to $1.51 billion, and profits plunged 41 percent, to $104 million. The company […]

Audible Shareholders Sue, Saying Company Broadcast the Wrong Message A group of Audible shareholders has filed a class action lawsuit against the company following its recent quarterly report and ensuing stock swoon (now down almost 50 percent from its recent high). The complaint charges that the company misrepresented its plans and objectives by not disclosing that, “(a) the Company’s heady growth could not continue without material investments in expensive strategic initiatives that would severely erode the Company’s earnings in the foreseeable future; and (b) the Company was about to embark on expensive strategic initiatives that would constitute a material risk […]