Tag Archives: publishing

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Magazines2.0 – does print-on-demand spell doom for the news-stand?

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magazines at the news-standIt’s no secret that a big part of the problem for science fiction magazines – and many other sorts of periodical publication – are the cost and logistical issues attached to printing and distributing the final product. You can buy the best fiction on the planet, hire the best columnists and artists… but if you can’t get that final product into the customer’s hands (or at least in front of their eyeballs), you’re going to struggle to sell copies. [image by Diane S Murphy]

Enter Hewlett Packard, who describe their new MagCloud service as “YouTube for magazines”. MagCloud has similarities to LuLu.com as well; basically, you upload your finished magazine as a PDF file, which MagCloud then lists in its catalogue for no charge. When a customer wants a copy, they log in, pay the cost… and get a printed version made especially for them.

Arch-fan (and Clarkesworld non-fiction editor) Cheryl Morgan can see a route ahead:

Where I do think that there is a potential business case is with small press magazines. The sales pitch would go something like this: yes, you can read it for free on the web; yes, you can download a PDF and print it yourself, but if you really want something glossy and physical then order it from MagCloud.

I’ll go one step further – there are server-side software engines that can be used to stitch together PDFs from HTML files, so you could allow your reader to custom-build a magazine to their own specifications from your stock of stories and articles, and then buy a unique printed version. If nothing else, it would mean you could avoid paying for a magazine which contained a story by an author whose work you just don’t enjoy.

Of course, as TechDirt points out MagCloud’s potential success is predicated on the assumption that interest in magazines among people tech-savvy enough to be aware of the service will continue for long enough for the business to grow (and, more importantly, for the currently prohibitive unit costs to fall)… and while I’m convinced that dead-tree books will last for a good few decades yet, I’m not so sure that the magazine format will have the same longevity.

What do you think? Would you be interested in a print version of sites like Futurismic – a story or two a month, a couple of essays and a sprinkling of blog posts selected from your favourite tags and search terms – or is the webzine at its best in its native non-physical environment?

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Why ebooks must fail

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book spine bindingYou may have seen this already, but just in case: Evan Schnittman is head of global business development at the Oxford University Press, and he sure knows how to make the first post on a new blog punch hard. In his inaugural piece, he explains why the success of consumer ebooks would collapse the publishing “Ponzi scheme”.

I’d advise reading the whole thing for a very honest warts-and-all explanation of the economics involved, but the money-shot is right at the end:

And therein lies the dilemma… how does the publishing industry fund the creation, editing, design, production, marketing, e-warehousing, and sales of ebooks, if the income isn’t there? How do ebooks cover the huge advances needed to buy books if we cannot generate the cash, especially at their extremely low, discounted prices, cover the advances that an entire industry has come to require? The answer is that ebooks, alone, cannot.

What this means is that unless a very different model evolves, ebooks can never become the dominant version of content sold by book publishers. It means that ebooks will always be priced to sell, but sold as an afterthought, not as the primary version of a work. It means that the need for blended e plus p models will evolve, in order to take advantage of all the great qualities of ebooks, while providing the financial support and structure that print offers. It means that consumer ebooks, as a stand-alone version of an intellectual property, must fail.

Of course, it’s not an utterly bleak prognosis; Schnittman promises to follow up with a series of business models that will explore the factors he describes, including one that he believes will let the publishers have their cake and eat it, and I know I’ll be looking forward to reading them. It’s good to find someone close to the core of the industry who isn’t beating around the ebook bush. [via GalleyCat; image by smellyknee]

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Progress – the ebooks debate rumbles on

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Progress - Penny Arcade on ebooksI suppose I shouldn’t be, but I can’t help feeling surprised at how widespread the debate about ebooks is becoming – I honestly didn’t expect so many people would care so soon. Penny Arcade‘s take is unsurprisingly snarky [see right], but also somewhat conservative given their games’n’gadgets leanings (even allowing for comic license).

The best thing about the breadth of the discussion is that we’re getting a whole lot of different perspectives beyond authors and book-nerds. For example, The Big Money gives us the business logistics guy’s view, namely that “[d]igital readers will save writers and publishing, even if they destroy the book business”:

Here’s where the Kindle comes in. The collapse of bookstores almost ensures that the Kindle will thrive. Not because it’s better than a book; that doesn’t matter. The nation-within-a-nation that reads for pleasure and to be informed is a small but vibrant republic. Heavy readers make up a large portion of the book-buying public. These are people who read two to three books a week and buy 50 or so books a year. The Kindle will solve a number of problems for the citizens of Biblandia, not the least of which is having to go find a bookstore to get their next read.

Elsewhere, uber-PR guy and social media pundit Steve Rubel sees the Kindle and its ilk as “the last Great White Hope” for monetizing text media like journalism:

The Kindle, like the iPod, is an emerging critical mass device that actually encourages people to pay for content rather than get it for free. When Apple launched the iTunes Music Store, people were skeptical that people would shell out cash for music they could snag for free from file sharing networks. They did. The same was true when Apple, and later others, rolled out movies. However, today millions rent or buy movies online.

The Kindle offers a similar experience in a much larger market – text. This one is tougher to monetize. In the digital age books have managed to remain premium content. However, beyond books, magazine and newspaper content is available in abundance online for free. Yet, I still believe that people will pay to receive some of their favorites on their Kindles or their Kindle-enabled phones. Meet them there now while you can.

And of course, there’s the segment of the publishing industry that has gotten itself beyond denial and/or arm-flapping to the point of grappling with the potential that’s sat on their doorstep. Rather than dismissing ereaders as imperfect implementations, the Pan Macmillan digital team are looking ahead to what they see as an inevitable “iPod moment” for text:

… the iPod had a phenomenally intuitive control, especially given the bemusing buttons and rollers of it’s competitors (and I should know as I held out for some time, before caving in with a combination of resignation and glee). Characteristic of it’s manufacturer this no doubt has been an enormous boon to the device. Beyond that though the now iconic look from legendary Apple designer Jonathan Ive was what made us want one. The iPod wasn’t just useful, fun etc- it was jaw grindingly desirable.

Usability and covetability. Two principles for world domination.

What strikes me as being the interesting parallel with these two, aside from the the slightly obvious observations just outlined, is that both came from behind. They did not have first mover advantage. Instead they used these design concepts to leapfrog into pole. Indeed, it could be argued that precisely not coming first was an advantage in that it allowed the pair to fine tune their product and get these two crucial areas right.

Going back to the ereader then, I get the sense that we are on the cusp of when useability and covetability collide, uniting in a glorious burst of reading device nirvana. Ok maybe not quite, but once those user interfaces have been tweaked, and once someone like Ive gets there hands on a reading device, they will be back.

So we’re not quite at the “all bets are off” stage, but we’re certainly beyond the point where it’s a few evangelists with sandwich-boards prophesying the end-times. The more I look at it, the more I suspect that with ebooks the question is no longer “if?” but “when?”

What about you lot – how many of you have a reader already, and how has it changed your text media consumption? And for those that don’t have one, what will be the change that makes you cross the line?

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Author decides to copy Radiohead’s business model

Here’s an experiment to keep a close eye on, if you’re curious about new business models for publishing books in the digital age. Publishers Faber and historian Ben Wilson are taking a page from Radiohead’s playbook and releasing Wilson’s latest book in digital form on a pay-what-you-like basis:

Wilson’s examination of the value and meaning of liberty will be available to download on 27 April, six weeks before it is published on paper at £14.99, with readers given the freedom to set their own price, or even download it for free.

It’s a strategy Wilson, whose two previous books were published conventionally by Faber as hardbacks, admits is “a gamble”. When he first heard about the “frightening idea of giving the book away”, his reaction was surprise. “I’ve published before,” he explains, “and you have that excitement of a book in physical form, so that’s what you expect”. But after a while “it clicked together so well with what I wanted to do with the book – the campaigning edge – that it made a lot of sense.”

It’s good to see that Wilson and Faber haven’t made the usual mistake with the Radiohead experiment, in that they’re plainly seeing it as being a publicity play as opposed to the main income stream. However, I think it fair to say that Wilson isn’t quite a household name like Radiohead (hence there’s nowhere near the same level of expectation around the launch) and that the books business is still very different to the music business (although they’re getting closer), so while the model is similar we’d all be foolish to expect a similar pattern of results.

But it’s very interesting to see Faber taking this step, not just grappling with the new technology of ebooks as a format but with the new economics of electronic media, where free is – for better or for worse – the best way of getting your product into people’s minds (and memory sticks). It also makes Harpercollins’ claims about ebook pricing look even more ropey… [via GalleyCat]

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Google to publishing: OM NOM NOM NOM

Google cookieRichard Sarnoff of the American Association of Publishers has been speculating about that organisation’s tabled deal with Google over its Book Search facility, and according to Ars Technica he claims the deal forces Google into direct competition with Amazon’s business model:

Sarnoff said the publishers he represents didn’t set out to create a monopoly in the markets for book search engines or online book sales. But he didn’t deny that the settlement could have that effect. After all, he noted, “copyright itself is a monopoly.”

It’s not often you hear that from someone on the publishing side of the equation. But it’s so far hard to tell who has actually got the better end of the deal:

Sarnoff outlined the terms of the settlement, which is expected to be approved by the courts later this year. It reads like a blueprint for the future of electronic book publishing, covering topics as wide-ranging as advertising, library access, and the treatment of orphan works. A key element of the agreement is the creation of a Book Rights Registry that will collect payments from Google and distribute them to authors and publishers. Sarnoff said the publishers pressed for the creation of this registry in part because it would be too “easy to disintermediate the publisher over time” if Google paid authors directly. Sarnoff said that the structure of the registry will be “tough to replicate for [Google’s] competitors.”

Only time will tell whether the AAP has taken the enemy to bed. But it’s grist for the mills of those who worry that Google is already too big for its boots – another discussion point where the word ‘monopoly’ tends to crop up with frequency, and one that varies in tone from polite concern to foaming-at-the-mouth paranoia and conspiracy theory.

What do think – will we be consumed by the silicon Rapture on the day Google finally crawls the DNA of each and every one of us? Or are they just a company who brought out the right business model at the right time?

I’m not that worried; from the looks of things, if Google does end up as a digital despot, at least I’ll have plenty of things to read… [image by massless]