Although ebooks are seen as the symbol of “disruption” in the trade book marketplace, they’re really just a part of it and they’re the trailing component, not the leading edge. Online sales of print books were making life more challenging for booksellers in the US even before the Kindle debuted in late 2007. And it […]
Is an 80% ebook world for straight text really in sight?
The recent news that digital revenues have reached approximately 20% at some of the Big Six houses makes me believe that we are on the verge of a tectonic shift in the industry. It provoked me to think through the logical extension of well-established trends and comment recently that I see an 80% ebook world […]
Kobo’s new deals propel them into the top tier of global ebook competitors
The week I spend each year at the Frankfurt Book Fair is always the most stimulating week of my professional year. The concentration of the best thinkers and most powerful people in publishing always seems to lead me to a new burst of understanding about our global publishing world, particularly in these times of rapid […]
Most dramatic publishing event of 2010? Introducing agency pricing!
Ed Nawotka, the editor of the Frankfurt Book Fair’s online publication “Publishing Perspectives”, is running a series of pieces responding to his question “what was the most dramatic event in publishing in 2010?” Here’s the answer from The Shatzkin Files. The most dramatic event in publishing in 2010? That’s easy. It was the face-down between […]
A Frankfurt reminder: the world is getting smaller
At the conclusion of another Frankfurt Book Fair — my thirty-somethingth — here is something I actually knew before but have taken on board in a whole new way: there is an enormous gap between the US and everyplace else in the Western world (at least) in consumer ebook takeup and acceptance. Here is what […]