April « 2007 « Publishing Talk

monetizing your content online

Jon Reed | 12:01 am 27 Apr 07 Comments Off

I love MONOCLE magazine. And not just because Tyler Brûlé is at the helm – one publisher against whom the ‘publisher as arbiter of taste’ argument actually stands up.
The magazine is well-produced – even a lovely object, with its stylish matt pages. I love its obsession with Japanese culture, the coverage of politics, design, business [...]

Anna Karenina lite

Jon Reed | 7:03 pm 25 Apr 07 Comments Off

Here’s something on which I think Margaret Atwood and I would agree. Orion Books is publishing a series of ‘Compact Editions’ of classic literature next week, billed as great reads ‘in half the time’. I don’t get it.
Orion Books believes that the 40% shorter versions would suit the modern reader. I would suggest [...]

london book fair 2.0

Jon Reed | 7:00 pm 23 Apr 07 Comments Off

Some of you may remember Peter Collingridge, MD of Apt Studio Ltd, from the Bookseller seminar ‘Reaching Readers Online’ in London last month. He wrote an excellent piece on where most publishers sit in relation to web 2.0 (or even web 1.0), during the London Book Fair:
In the caffeinated, optimistic and excitable spirit of the [...]

Second Life Book Fair (no, really)

Jon Reed | 3:00 pm 20 Apr 07 Comments 3

OK, if we’ve all finished with the hoopla of this year’s London Book Fair and all the agonising over the digital future of the book (so five years ago), here’s something to make Margaret Atwood choke on her bathwater:
Second Life Book Fair
20-22 April 2007

It’s the inaugural one. Organised by Poinky Malaprop, with involvement from Selina [...]

the iPod moment

Jon Reed | 11:55 am Comments Off

At the risk of making this Macmillan News Week (feel free to send me your news@publishingtalk.eu!), it has come to my attention that Sara Lloyd, Head of Digital Publishing at Pan Macmillan and friend of the show, was appearing live on BBC2’s Working Lunch while I was at the London Book Fair this week.
She [...]

57 academics just punched the air

Jon Reed | 4:58 pm 19 Apr 07 Comments Off

One Marketing Director also punched the air at a London Book Fair seminar this week when, in response to the question “which book campaign has made the best use of online techniques in the last year?”, panellist David Freeman cited The RSC Shakespeare: The Complete Works, published today by Palgrave Macmillan.
For those page-sniffing book-as-object fetishists, [...]

the future of the book

Jon Reed | 6:23 pm 18 Apr 07 Comments Off

In January this year, Google hosted a conference in New York called Unbound: Advancing Book Publishing in a Digital World. The video excerpts below highlight the issues I believe we should be discussing in relation to the future of the book:

I went to a discussion at the South Bank Centre in London yesterday, called Digitise [...]

get a second life

Jon Reed | 4:08 pm 13 Apr 07 Comments Off

The recent informative Bookseller seminar in London, ‘Reaching Readers Online’, focused on the use of social media in general, and social networking sites in particular. Specifically, their use by book publishers wanting to reach niche markets and interest groups though viral marketing. You’ve probably come across MySpace, Facebook and YouTube. Far more radical, and less [...]

why you should be podcasting

Jon Reed | 4:13 pm 11 Apr 07 Comments Off

I was recently at the Corporate Podcasting Summit Europe in London – two days of intense discussion, presentation and sharing of best practice. Podcasting is barely two years old, and it feels like being in at the start of the Internet again, before the conventions, practices and business models had developed. There was almost no [...]

welcome to publishing talk

Jon Reed | 4:04 pm 10 Apr 07 Comments Off

Welcome to Publishing Talk. This blog will be a regular source of articles, comment and opinion on trends in publishing – both print and digital. I use a very wide definition of publishing – anyone who produces original, branded content for print, web or audio is a publisher!
Topics will include book, journal and magazine publishing, [...]