Web Standards for E-books

Here’s an excellent article about the real world challenges and pitfalls of producing an eBook in 2010.  Toronto journalist and author Joe Clark does a wonderful job of watering down and simplifying the often complex process of using XHTML and EPUB to produce eBooks that look good, no matter what device they are read on. (Thanks to Dave H. over at MacRaven for sharing!)

JESS3 Video: The State of The Internet

TIP: Watch this 4 minute video...then watch it again!

JESS3 / The State of The Internet from JESS3 on Vimeo.

Quote of the Day:

Math of Publishing Meets the E-Book

“The only thing I think is a mistake is people trying to hold back e-books or Kindle and trying to head off this revolution by building a dam. It’s not going to work.”

-Anne Rice

http://htxt.it/rIMS

 

O'Reilly TOC Publishing Conference 2010

For those of you who aren't afraid to openly embrace the latest The Tools of Change brought to fruition from the intersection of art, technology and business, the O'Reilly TOC Publishing Conference 2010 was held in NYC this week.

Unfortunately, I couldn't make it this year, but the folks behind the event were hip enough to kindly (and rather quickly I might add) share the keynotes, interviews, photos and PPT's, to make us all feel special. If you're willing to spend a few hours, the quality of the content is outstanding...

SPEAKER SLIDES & VIDEOS:

YOU TUBE CHANNEL:

FLICKR ALBUM:

#toccon


Enjoy!
todd

What Is Open Leadership?

Great quote below from a slideshow presentation by Charlene Li on Developing A Social Strategy Webinar.

OPEN LEADERSHIP: "Having the confidence and the humility to give up the need to be in control, while inspiring commitment from people to accomplish goals."

Tools of Change Keynotes

Listening to the free On-Demand TOC keynote streams...Looking forward to getting copies of the slides in a few days.

Special thanks to O'Reilly and the event sponsors!

https://en.oreilly.com/toc2010/user/account/signup/user/1

What Aren't eBooks Cheaper Than Physical Books?

Best explanation yet, as to why eBooks aren't much cheaper than their printed brethren...http://htxt.it/rp2k

Given by Ron Boehm, President and CEO, ABC-CLIO Publishing

(Special thanks to Sue Polanka for posting it to her No Shelf Required blog!)

Sivamani: Rhythm is everything, everywhere | Video on TED.com

Sivamani: Rhythm is everything, everywhere | Video on TED.com

Definitely one of the hippest & original solo acts I've ever seen!

RCA's New Lexi eReader

Here's a quick video interview of Audiovox President, Tom Malone, showing off the new RCA Lexi eReader shown at CES 2010 two weeks ago. MSRP is $229 and content will be provided by Barnes & Noble.

To learn more, the press release is HERE...

Amazon Offers 70% Royalty

Source: Publishers Lunch

Amazon Offers 70% Royalty--If You Self-Publish Inexpensively, and Comprehensively
Amazon has offered authors and publishers using their self-service digital text platform a significantly enhanced royalty option as of June 30--70 percent instead of 30 percent--provided that certain specific conditions are met:

* The ebook should be not too cheap and not too expensive--priced between $9.99 and $2.99--and the digital list price has to be "at least 20 percent below the lowest physical list price for the print book"

* It has to be available for sale in all territories in which the author or publisher has rights

* It has to be available for text-to-speech, and whatever other new features Kindle adds in the future

* "Books must be offered at or below price parity with competition, including physical book prices. Amazon will provide tools to automate that process, and the 70 percent royalty will be calculated off the sales price."

Release

Word of the Day

DISPOSITIVE - providing a final resolution (as of an issue) : having control over an outcome [Merriam-Webster's Dictionary of Law, © 1996 Merriam-Webster, Inc.]

4 Easy Steps for Making Free Ringtones for iPhones

Ever wanted to make a ringtone for your iPhone, but didn’t want to pay again for a song that you already own?  Well, now you can…..Simply use Quicktime Pro (not the new dumbed-down Quicktime 7 player)

 

STEP 1 - Open your music source file and select the desired ringtone portion  

STEP 2 - Crop to that selection and then "Save As iTunes Movie" with some name like MyZippyRingtone.  QTPro will save it with the .m4v extension

STEP 3- Change the extension to .m4r and drag the file to iTunes, where it will be added to the library as a Ringtone 

STEP 4 - Sync it to your iPhone and select it from the Settings screen

 

 (Thanks Tom N. !)

Is there a model for success selling content?

Great post by Mike Shatzkin on his Idea Logical Blog about the downfall of the publishing business…Couple of direct quotes below…[btw - I don’t think he’s being pessimistic, just brutally honest!]

 

• So far, all that is clear is that publishers that stick to an audience fare better in the digital world than the ones who don’t. Their marketing costs are lower and their reach to the audience is both more effective and less dependent on intermediaries

 

• Publishers have always focused primarily on the content. Survival in the future will require focusing on the market

 

• If you don’t own the audience, the cost of reaching it for one book at a time will be prohibitive

Urgent note to book industry: There's a better way to window eBooks

HERE is a great post by James McQuivey over at Forrester...I haven't read a better blog post than this for quite a while and I really appreciate his honesty and bluntness to the Publishing industry!

eBook Research

Here's some recent research from Mediamark related to eBooks...

- 2.1 million U.S. adults own electronic book readers
- Mostly well educated with high incomes (i.e.  Bachelor's or post-graduate degree and earning over 100K)
- Adults ages 35-54 are the "sweet spot" for this product
- E-book owners are particularly Web-centric

http://www.mediamark.com