Thursday, July 06, 2006

Publishing News: Waterstones, Google and Copyright

Waterstones: It's the World Cup's Fault
I know it can't get over England's premature exit from the World cup, but I don't blame the world cup for a decrease in my productivity. (That would probably be due to the quad combo of US Open, Wimbledon, WC and Tour de France). Waterstones can't seem to catch a break, and as we noted when the Ottakars deal went through, the shine has gone off the UK book retailer market and this isn't good news for Waterstones. Remember Borders also referenced slower UK sales in their report a few months ago - no mention of the world cup though.

Google vs the Publishers - reprise
No idea why the Guardian is rehashing this story about Google being sued by the US publishers for their indiscriminate copying program. What is interesting is the sub-head suggests this could be a really interesting article about the future of publishing say 2020 but no. The article restates what many have already said about the Google program. What should be interesting to everyone is whether Google will change publishing and if so what does that mean? What will publishing companies look like? What will libraries be? Where will bookstores be? I have yet to see an article presented in the national press that thoughtfully discuss these issues.

Free with Purchase: Ferrari
I will have to look into this. The owner of Charterhouse Publishing is selling the business and the purchaser gets to keep the company car - a 308 Ferrari.

Is a Blogging Academic Publishing?
Interesting view point from the NY Observer and perhaps an accurate reflection of the direction of academic publishing. While blogs will retain significant attention when topical and intelligent, if the writer wants to condense the subject into something like book form it seems to me the book is still the answer. This is definitely not a bad thing since publishing via a blog is of course kinda like market research.

Gourmet Magazine to Publish Summer Book List
Phillips Electronics is sponsoring a 102 page supplement to be distributed with the August issue of Gourmet. Authors Conroy, Pratchet, Smiley are just some of the authors writing about food.

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