A few interesting moves in the book publishing industry this week.
First, Thomas Nelson has begun a program called NelsonFree in which the price of a hardcover book also includes an audio download and an e-book download. The downloads will be available in MP3 format for audio and a number of e-book formats including EPub, the odds-on favorite right now over PDF or various proprietory formats to become the eventual universal format for e-readers. This is a savy move that will help brick and mortar bookstores compete with online stores.
Speaking of e-readers, Amazon.com came underfire recently because the new version Kindle has the ability to read text outloud. The Authors Guild and others felt this interferred with audio rights which are usually licensed separately. This week Amazon backed off and said the rights holders—authors or publishers—would be able to choose if they wanted this feature to be turned off on individual books.
The National Federation for the Blind opposed this, but most publishers automatically allow their books to be translated into Braille without charge and I’m sure a special arrangement for the sight-impaired can be worked out—and should be.
Finally, under the subtitle: Another One Sells Out to the Big Boys, Berkeley’s Ten Speed Press—a well-thought-of successful independent publisher—has been sold to Random House. At last count, I think Random House owned somthing like 375 of the largest book imprints in the nation. Random House in turn is owned by Germany-based Bertelsmann AG.
The more consolidation of imprints into the big publishing houses, the better for independent publishers such as Quill Driver Books.