MobileRead Forums

Thu July 10 2014

Nano-pixel discovery, screens of the future?
06:56 AM by owly in E-Book General \| News Heard about this on Swedish Radios Science news, "A new discovery [at Oxford University]will make it possible to create pixels just a few hundred nanometres across that could pave the way for extremely high-resolution and low-energy thin, flexible displays for applications such as 'smart' glasses, synthetic retinas, and foldable screens." http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases...0709140115.htm
[ 6 replies ]

Smashwords Releases 2014 Indie E-book Sales Survey
06:49 AM by AnemicOak in E-Book General \| News Readers in the market for indie or self-published e-books favor longer works, priced between $2.99 and $3.99, and are attracted by free e-book promotions, according to data from the third annual 2014 Smashwords Survey. The annual survey is based on data from $25 million in sales generated by the indie/self-publishing e-book vendor. While average lower e-book pricing continues to drive higher author earnings, Coker said this does not mean that "ultra low prices" are necessary. He noted that the "sweet spot" appears to be between $2.99 and $3.99 for bestselling titles. He emphasized that incremental increases in a title's sales ranking are "usually matched by an exponential increase in sales." He also said that, according to the data, indie e-books selling for $2.99/$3.99 earn as much for their authors as conventionally published e-books selling for $7.99 or more, but generate "triple the readership." http://www.publishersweekly.com/pw/b...es-survey.html The original Smashwords blog post can be found here... http://blog.smashwords.com/2014/07/2...veals-new.html .
[ 1 reply ]

Amazon makes a direct offer to Hachette authors: 100% ebook royalties
06:49 AM by Top100EbooksRank in E-Book General \| News https://gigaom.com/2014/07/08/amazon...e-full-letter/ The full letter “Dear XX, I wanted to ask your opinion about an idea we’ve had that would take authors out of the middle of the Hachette-Amazon dispute (actually it would be a big windfall for authors) and would motivate both Hachette and Amazon to work faster to resolve the situation. Our first choice would be to resolve a dispute like this through discussion only. We tried that already. We reached out to Hachette for the first time to discuss terms at the beginning of January for our contract which terminated in March. We heard nothing from them for three full months. We extended the contract into April under existing terms. Still nothing. In fact we got no conversation at all from Hachette until we started reducing our on-hand print inventory and reducing the discounts we offer customers off their list prices. Even since then, weeks have gone by while we waited for them to get back to us. After our last proposal to them on June 5th, they waited a week to respond at all, promising a counteroffer the following week. We are still waiting a month later. We agree that authors are caught in the middle while these negotiations drag on, and we’re particularly sensitive to the effect on debut and midlist authors. But Hachette’s unresponsiveness and unwillingness to talk until we took action put us in this position, and unless Hachette dramatically changes their negotiating tempo, this is going to take a really long time. Here’s what we’re thinking of proposing to them: • If Hachette agrees, for as long as this dispute lasts, Hachette authors would get 100% of the sales price of every Hachette e-book we sell. Both Amazon and Hachette would forego all revenue and profit from the sale of every e-book until an agreement is reached. • Amazon would also return to normal levels of on-hand print inventory, return to normal pricing in all formats, and for books that haven’t gone on sale yet, reinstate pre-orders. Here’s an example: if we sell a book at $9.99, the author would get the full $9.99, many multiples of what they would normally get. We can begin implementing this arrangement in 72 hours if Hachette agrees. We haven’t sent this offer to Hachette yet — we’re sending this to a few authors and agents to get feedback first. What do you think? Would this be helpful, especially for midlist and debut authors? Can we talk on the phone later today or tomorrow once you’ve had a chance to digest? Thanks and look forward to talking.” Statements from Hachette and Amazon Hachette: “Amazon has just sent us a brief proposal. We invite Amazon to withdraw the sanctions they have unilaterally imposed, and we will continue to negotiate in good faith and with the hope of a swift conclusion. We believe that the best outcome for the writers we publish is a contract with Amazon that brings genuine marketing benefits and whose terms allow Hachette to continue to invest in writers, marketing, and innovation. We look forward to resolving this dispute soon and to the benefit of the writers who have trusted their books to us.” Amazon: “We call baloney. Hachette is part of a $10 billion global conglomerate. It wouldn’t be ‘suicide.* They can afford it. What they’re really making clear is that they absolutely want their authors caught in the middle of this negotiation because they believe it increases their leverage. All the while, they are stalling and refusing to negotiate, despite the pain caused to their authors. Our offer is sincere. They should take us up on it.” *Hachette previously described Amazon’s proposal as “suicidal” in a statement to the Wall Street Journal; the story has since been updated and that reference removed.
[ 87 replies ]

Sat July 05 2014

MobileRead Week in Review: 06/28 - 07/05
06:00 AM by Alexander Turcic in Miscellaneous \| Week in Review Another week, another steady stream of e-book goodness here on MobileRead. Our authentic roundup of what's been going on: E-Book General - News Bertelsmann getting out of book retailing Amazon: Business As Usual? E-Book General - Reading Recommendations July 2014 Book Club Vote

Thu July 03 2014

Amazon: Business As Usual?
07:21 AM by AnemicOak in E-Book General \| News Yesterday the NYPL hosted a live discussion on Amazon and the future of publishing. In April 2014, Amazon and Hachette locked horns in what has become a very public, and still ongoing, battle over contract negotiations. After the online retailer removed the pre-order option, imposed shipping delays, and slashed discounts on the book publisher's titles, the reaction against Amazon was swift and fierce. But the story of the Amazon-Hachette dispute is anything but simple, and raises critical questions about the future of the book publishing industry. What is really at stake for the companies, authors and readers? What larger issues of free-market capitalism and free speech are at play? And what does the Amazon-Hachette dispute reveal about the future of the publishing industry in the age of e-books? Authors, agents, and publishers take to the LIVE from the NYPL stage to tackle these urgent questions in a conversation moderated by Tina Bennett, literary agent at WME. Guests include: best-selling author James Patterson; Morgan Entrekin, publisher and president of Grove Atlantic; Bob Kohn, attorney and founder of EMusic.com; Tim Wu, law professor and theorist of “net neutrality;” Danielle Allen, political theorist, author of a new book on the Declaration of Independence and elected chair of the Pulitzer Prize Board; and David Vandagriff, intellectual property lawyer. I don't have time to watch it right now, but from the comments on the video stream page it looks like more of the usual stuff. Anyway, thought I'd pass along the link for anyone interested in it... http://new.livestream.com/theNYPL/businessasusual .
[ 75 replies ]

Bertelsmann getting out of book retailing
07:17 AM by fjtorres in E-Book General \| News WSJ link: http://online.wsj.com/news/article_e...MDAwMjEwNDIyWj German media conglomerate Bertelsmann SE announced earlier this month it would close its bookselling business in its German-speaking markets, after years of declining sales. The company's retail locations as well as the online store, branded under the "Der Club" label, will cease operations in Germany, Austria and Switzerland by the end of 2015, spelling the end to almost all of Bertelsmann's remaining bookselling activities. The first retail store opened in 1964 and they then expanded across Germany. Meanwhile, the book-club business grew across Europe and North America, offering book subscriptions at a discount by signing readers up for bulk purchases. By 1992, there were more than 300 stores in Germany alone and more than seven million members enrolled in the Bertelsmann book club. Today, only 52 locations remain and sales have fallen sharply, down to less than €100 million, or roughly $136 million, from a peak of €700 million in the mid-1990s. With the rise of the Internet, German book-buying habits have sharply changed over the past decade. Last year, some €1.6 billion of books—16.3% of all books sold—were sold via the Internet. About 70% of online and mail-ordered printed and digital books are sold via Amazon.com Inc., according to industry data. All the german Amazon angst is over eleven percent market share?!! Since the 1960s, Bertelsmann has diversified into other media channels, buying and then selling stakes in music ventures like Sony Music as well as other joint ventures like an ill-fated deal with AOL Inc. in the 1990s. The company has also acquired assets such as the German magazine publisher Gruner & Jahr, German television stations under RTL Group, RTL.BT +0.37% and the U.S. book publisher Random House, all areas where the company continues to look for growth. "Bertelsmann has come a long way from bookselling," said Bettina Deuscher, a media analyst at Landesbank Baden-Wuerttemberg. "The bulk of its revenues today come from TV, publishing and business services. More at the source... (Might expire)
[ 13 replies ]

Tue July 01 2014

July 2014 Book Club Vote
12:54 AM by WT Sharpe in Reading Recommendations \| Book Clubs July 2014 MobileRead Book Club Vote Help us choose a book as the July 2014 eBook for the MobileRead Book Club. The poll will be open for 5 days. There will be no runoff vote unless the voting results a tie, in which case there will be a 3 day run-off poll. This is a visible poll: others can see how you voted. It is You may cast a vote for each book that appeals to you. We will start the discussion thread for this book on July 20th. Select from the following Official Choices with three nominations each: • Your Inner Fish: A Journey into the 3.5-Billion-Year History of the Human Body by Neil Shubin Amazon Au / Amazon Ca / Amazon UK / Amazon US / Barnes & Noble / Google Play Spoiler: Amazon.com Review Oliver Sacks on Your Inner Fish: (Since the 1970 publication of Migraine, neurologist Oliver Sacks's unusual and fascinating case histories of "differently brained" people and phenomena—a surgeon with Tourette's syndrome, a community of people born totally colorblind, musical hallucinations, to name a few--have been marked by extraordinary compassion and humanity, focusing on the patient as much as the condition. His books include The Man Who Mistook His Wife for a Hat, Awakenings (which inspired the Oscar-nominated film), and 2007's Musicophilia. He lives in New York City, where he is Professor of Clinical Neurology at Columbia University.) Your Inner Fish is my favorite sort of book—an intelligent, exhilarating, and compelling scientific adventure story, one which will change forever how you understand what it means to be human. The field of evolutionary biology is just beginning an exciting new age of discovery, and Neil Shubin's research expeditions around the world have redefined the way we now look at the origins of mammals, frogs, crocodiles, tetrapods, and sarcopterygian fish—and thus the way we look at the descent of humankind. One of Shubin's groundbreaking discoveries, only a year and a half ago, was the unearthing of a fish with elbows and a neck, a long-sought evolutionary "missing link" between creatures of the sea and land-dwellers. My own mother was a surgeon and a comparative anatomist, and she drummed it into me, and into all of her students, that our own anatomy is unintelligible without a knowledge of its evolutionary origins and precursors. The human body becomes infinitely fascinating with such knowledge, which Shubin provides here with grace and clarity. Your Inner Fish shows us how, like the fish with elbows, we carry the whole history of evolution within our own bodies, and how the human genome links us with the rest of life on earth. Shubin is not only a distinguished scientist, but a wonderfully lucid and elegant writer; he is an irrepressibly enthusiastic teacher whose humor and intelligence and spellbinding narrative make this book an absolute delight. Your Inner Fish is not only a great read; it marks the debut of a science writer of the first rank. • Rites of Spring: The Great War and the Birth of the Modern Age by Modris Eksteins Amazon US / Barnes & Noble / Google Play / Kobo Spoiler: A rare and remarkable cultural history of World War I that unearths the roots of modernism Dazzling in its originality, Rites of Spring probes the origins, impact, and aftermath of World War I, from the premiere of Stravinsky's ballet The Rite of Spring in 1913 to the death of Hitler in 1945. Recognizing that “The Great War was the psychological turning point . . . for modernism as a whole,” author Modris Eksteins examines the lives of ordinary people, works of modern literature, and pivotal historical events to redefine the way we look at our past and toward our future. • Gulp: Adventures on the Alimentary Canal by Mary Roach Amazon US / Barnes & Noble / Google Play (ePub) / Kobo Spoiler: The alimentary canal—the much-maligned tube from mouth to rear—is as taboo, in its way, as the cadavers in Stiff, and as surreal as the universe of zero gravity explored in Packing for Mars. In Gulp we meet the scientists who tackle the questions no one else thinks—or has the courage—to ask. How much can you eat before your stomach bursts? Why doesn't the stomach digest itself? Can wine tasters really tell a $10 bottle from a $100 bottle? Why is crunchy food so appealing? Can constipation kill you? Did it kill Elvis? We go on location to a pet food taste-test lab, a fecal transplant, and into a live stomach to observe the fate of a meal. Why is crunchy food so appealing? Why is it so hard to find words for flavors and smells? Why doesn’t the stomach digest itself? How much can you eat before your stomach bursts? Can constipation kill you? Did it kill Elvis? In Gulp we meet scientists who tackle the questions no one else thinks of—or has the courage to ask. We go on location to a pet-food taste-test lab, a fecal transplant, and into a live stomach to observe the fate of a meal. With Roach at our side, we travel the world, meeting murderers and mad scientists, Eskimos and exorcists (who have occasionally administered holy water rectally), rabbis and terrorists—who, it turns out, for practical reasons do not conceal bombs in their digestive tracts. Like all of Roach's books, Gulp is as much about human beings as it is about human bodies. • The Glory of Their Times by Lawrence Ritter Amazon US / Barnes & Noble Spoiler: When baseball great Ty Cobb died in 1961, Ritter got the idea to interview the few remaining contemporaries of Cobb before they too all died. The result was a highly respected best seller, an oral history. "Almost perfect . . . a vivid, gentle, and humorous narrative, accompanied by marvelous photographs." - The New Yorker "Easily the best baseball book ever produced by anyone." -- -- Cleveland Plain Dealer "I could happily reread every summer for the rest of my life that greatest of all baseball books..." -- -- Stephen Jay Gould, The New York Times Book Review "Quite simply the best sports book in recent memory." -- -- Wilfrid Sheed, The New York Times Book Review "The single best baseball book of all time." -- -- Red Barber "There's not a dull moment in the whole book." -- The Raleigh (N.C.) News and Observer "The Glory of Their Times will be around as long as baseball." -- -- Nelson Algren • The Best American Science and Nature Writing 2013 edited by Siddhartha Mukherjee Amazon Ca / Amazon US / Barnes & Noble / Kobo / OverDrive Spoiler: Pulitzer Prize–winning author Siddhartha Mukherjee, a leading cancer physician and researcher, selects the year’s top science and nature writing from journalists who dive into their fields with curiosity and passion, delivering must-read articles from a wide array of fields. Some of the more intriguing sounding titles in this collection of essays include "On Tenderness", "Beyond the Quantum Horizon", "Is Space Digital?", "The Sweet Spot in Time", "Machines of the Infinite", "Altered States", "Super Humanity", "Is Facebook Making Us Lonely?", "The Wisdom of Psychopaths", and much more. • The Bible Unearthed by Israel Finkelstein & Neil Asher Silberman Amazon Au / Amazon Ca / Amazon UK / Amazon US Spoiler: From Goodreads: The Bible Unearthed: Archaeology's New Vision of Ancient Israel and the Origin of Its Sacred Texts In this groundbreaking work that sets apart fact and legend, authors Finkelstein and Silberman use significant archeological discoveries to provide historical information about biblical Israel and its neighbors. In this iconoclastic and provocative work, leading scholars Israel Finkelstein and Neil Asher Silberman draw on recent archaeological research to present a dramatically revised portrait of ancient Israel and its neighbors. They argue that crucial evidence (or a telling lack of evidence) at digs in Israel, Egypt, Jordan, and Lebanon suggests that many of the most famous stories in the Bible -- the wanderings of the patriarchs, the Exodus from Egypt, Joshua's conquest of Canaan, and David and Solomon's vast empire; -- reflect the world of the later authors rather than actual historical facts. Challenging the fundamentalist readings of the scriptures and marshaling the latest archaeological evidence to support its new vision of ancient Israel, The Bible Unearthed offers a fascinating and controversial perspective on when and why the Bible was written and why it possesses such great spiritual and emotional power today.
[ 11 replies - poll! ]

Sat June 28 2014

S&S Opens E-Book Lending to All Libraries
12:34 PM by AnemicOak in E-Book General \| News In the US anyway, not sure if this is also in other markets or not... As the American Library Association Annual Conference kicks off in Las Vegas, Simon & Schuster has announced that, following a "successful pilot program” in 20 select library systems, it will now open its catalog of e-books to all libraries nationwide. S&S e-books are currently available through the 3M, Baker & Taylor and Overdrive platforms. Each title licensed by a library is usable for one year from the date of purchase, for an unlimited number of checkouts during the one-year term, on a one user/one copy model. Frontlist and backlist titles are available simultaneously with their print publication. In addition, Simon & Schuster’s e-book program includes a “Buy It Now” capability, with a portion of each patron purchase going to the library. http://www.publishersweekly.com/pw/b...libraries.html ALA Press Release... http://www.ala.org/news/press-releas...-ebook-lending S&S Press Release (PDF)... http://d1hbl61hovme3a.cloudfront.net...0Expansion.pdf
[ 23 replies ]

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