September 2011 - All Star Press

Richard Branson gives Time Management Advice. Authors Listen Up!

Entrepreneur Richard Branson says that his best advice for managing your time effectively is to stay focused. Distraction is time lost. Manage your mobile device, Branson says. Don’t let it manage you. Check email in bursts and then put it away to concentrate on the task at hand. When it comes to managing others’ time, it’s better to give your employees space than micro managing. As long as you’ve hired people you trust, you will feel comfortable giving them the reins and letting them take responsibility for their actions.

“Many executives check their smartphones throughout meetings and during off-hours. This is not good for concentration, and has a negative impact on decision making. Use it only in bursts: check emails for an hour or so and then put it away…”

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Portland Library offers Kindle books

A library in Mulnomah County (Portland, OR) said cardholders can now check out e-books on their Amazon Kindle or mobile devices, such as the iPhone, tablets such as the iPad, and devices running Google Inc.’s Android operating system with the free Kindle app.

More than 10,000 titles are available and patrons will need both a library card and, of course, an Amazon account.

The length of the loan, the library says, depends on the format and the patron’s preference.

Unflattering Review of the Amazon Tablet, aka Kindle Fire

Amazon Kindle Fire tablet — ETC@USC/flickr

Tomorrow Amazon will unveil its answer to the iPad, says TechCrunch’s MG Seigler. “On Wednesday morning in New York City, Amazon will unveil the Kindle Fire, which is expected to retail for around $250.

It is designed for two fingers, instead of ten. It is described as “like the BlackBerry Playbook, but not in a good way.”

A New Competitor in the e-book Industry

Book publishers are surrounded by hungry new competitors: Amazon, with its steadily growing imprints; authors who publish their own e-books; and online start-ups like All Star Press.

Now they have to contend with another group elbowing into their territory: news organizations.

Swiftly and at little cost, newspapers, magazines and sites like The Huffington Post are hunting for revenue by publishing their own version of e-books, either using brand-new content or repurposing material that they may have given away free in the past.

And by making e-books that are usually shorter, cheaper to buy and more quickly produced than the typical book, they are redefining what an e-book is — and who gets to publish it.

The Birds of America released as an e-book

The Natural History Museum in the UK has launched its first e-book for the iPad, created from the most expensive book ever sold, John James Audubon’s The Birds of America.

The e-book features all 435 illustration plates of the original. The NHM will release a resized printed edition of the 19th-century classic in October, bound in linen and presented in a slipcase, with an introduction by bird artist and author David Allen Sibley.

The complete e-book will be priced £9.99, with the digital Highlights edition, featuring only 85 plates, priced at only £3.99.

A Writers’ Bill of Rights?

Earlier this week the Writers’ Union of Canada released “A Writer’s Bill of Rights for the Digital Age.” The 12-point document addresses concerns and challenges writers face due to the changing publishing landscape, as the industry transitions from a traditional to digital model.

Demands include that “the publisher shall split the net proceeds of ebook sales equally with the author” and that “when a book is out of print in print form, continuing sales in electronic form shall not prevent a rights reversion to the author.” Author Greg Hollingshead, chair of the Writers’ Union of Canada, answered some questions about the bill of rights… READ MORE

The Dynamic Publishing Industry

September 2011

What the publishing industry faces right now is a customer base that demands a digital product even as the technology that makes these products possible is still in its early stages of development. Random House has experienced a 200 percent growth in eBook sales this year, and every other company’s sales tell similar tales. The various devices on the market—the Kindle, the Nook, and the Kobo eReader, among others—all do different things. Thanks to each business’s attempt to dominate the market, they are mostly incompatible with each other. For example, the Nook and Apple’s iPad feature color displays for picture books, but for the time being the Kindle does not.

How can…READ MORE

The Color Purple released as an e-book

Author Alice Walker’s “The Color Purple,” a Pulitzer Prize winner in 1983 and still a widely taught and discussed classic, is finally coming out as an e-book.

But the classic novel in e-book format is not being released by a traditional publisher.

Open Road Integrated Media, a digital publishing company co-founded two years ago by former HarperCollins CEO Jane Friedman, has reached an agreement with author Alice Walker to release the electronic version of “The Color Purple” and most of her other work in the latest technology.

IKEA introduces bookless “book”shelves

IKEA has noticed a shift in what consumers are storing on their bookshelves. After all, a Kindle can hold thousands more books than a wooden tower in the living room. According to the Economist, next month Ikea will release a new version of its classic Billy bookshelf, one that’s focused less on storing books than on storing everything else.

Ebooks have become the single bestselling category in American publishing for the first time, according to new data released last April.

By contrast, sales of adult fiction in hardback so far this year have fallen by over 10% according to book sales monitor Nielsen BookScan… Read more

New horse racing e-book for Keeneland

Did you know that…Keeneland racetrack in Lexington, KY held 161 thoroughbred races on 17 days in the fall of 2010.

Trainers winning at least two races totaled 28.

The 28 multiple winners won a total of 110 races collectively or 68% of all races.
Of the 28 multiple winners, nine trainers won at least five races.
Those nine trainers collected a total 64 wins or 40% of all races.

Profiting at Keeneland for handicappers is all about knowing the tendencies of the individuals that know how to win year-in and year-out at the Lexington racetrack. Click here to learn more about a new handicapping book.