publishing

Further Thoughts on E-Publishing And Missing Out

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Serdar brought up the point that in a way, publishers brought the Amazon mess on themselves because they resisted e-book technology. I think he had a brilliant insight, and want to expand on it further.

Let’s take a look at the whole Kindle idea. In many ways it’s a bare-bones thing (at least before the Tablet), a black-and-white-display (however with cool e-Ink), simple delivery, basic formatting. The Kindle is impressive as a unified system, but except for that e-ink, it doesn’t seem that innovative, from file format to the menu

But what Amazon did is string the links together in a chain that worked. They pushed it, they stuck buy it, they evolved it. I myself used to think the Kindle sounded ridiculous, now I own one. The Nook sounded like a runner-up, and now I not only hear great things, I have a friend who can’t put her’s down.

The iPad? Yeah.  Some issues but the big lawsuit shows Apple was big enough to talk with . . .

Of course each “link” chain should be obvious, but the Publishers didn’t  follow that.

All those publishers had money. They had technology. They had allies in book chains. They had people talking about eBooks and playing with formats.

They didn’t do anything. They left it to Amazon and Apple and Barnes and Noble. The Publishers avoided or dodged, didn’t take risks, and by and large let everyone else into the mobile space.

An alliance of publishers could have rallied around ePub. It could have backed a new device. It could have done all sorts of things. It didn’t exist and it didn’t happen.

Now what? I’ve launched books on my own, and the only reason to have a publisher is the marketing advantage (and there’s several small and mids for that). So many are exploring e-books. EVERYONE has to be on Kindle, and B&N is coming from behind (which I need to address in my own books).

It’s going to get wild, isn’t it?  Maybe people thinking of working for traditional publishing need to be thinking outside the box . . .

– Steven Savage

Pottermore: Harry Potter Ebooks Out!

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The long-promised eBooks (and more) are available at the site!

So of course, you can bet we’re going to watch this one – because there’s not much out there like “Pottermore”, so it’s kind of a giant lab experiment.

Thoughts:

  • I think there will be attempts to do more “Pottermores” no matter what the success of the site – the model is interesting enough and amorphous enough for people to give it a go.  If it works is a bit of a question.
  • Meanwhile GigaOm chimes in with a great article on what publishers can learn from Pottermore, and points out DRM *is not your friend*.
  • Building on that issue, one of the flamingly, neon-bright obvious things from Pottermore is that people respond to a good property, a place to gather, and response.  The entire “walled garden” model of publishing is missing the fact you have an economy/culture building on connectivity.
  • The Pottermore site may seem complex, but consider how fast sites can be put together these days – so it may be easy to create “lesser Pottermores.”
  • I could see people building web/media careers on creating “Pottermore” like sites.  Of course, if someone founded a business to easily make these central sites for indie media properties . . .
  • Pottermore represents a multimedia exploration that is only just starting.  What if a site with books tied into an MMO?  Films?  DLC?

– Steven Savage

 

Thomas Pugh’s Blog Tour: Welcome to Rollicking Tales!

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In some ways I feel a bit of a fraud offering up advice to would be self or small press publishers. After all I haven’t been in the game very long, it was only January that the Rollicking Tales wagon really began to roll. But then, when I come to think about all the things I have found out it has actually been a very steep learning curve. And if I can impart even one pearl of wisdom to a prospective publisher and help get more stories out there, then it will be worthwhile.

As a bit of background I am a farmer with, up until recently, no experience of the publishing world. I’ve been dabbling in writing for a few years but had never actually finished a story, let alone looked at publishing my own or other people’s work.

Then, in the autumn of 2011 I came to the conclusion that it was time I pulled my finger out. However many ideas I had for stories they were never going to see the light of day unless I sat down and actually wrote. A whole story. Right to the end.

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