Group items tagged

the news platforms a person is using can play a bigger role in making them feel overwhelmed than the sheer number of news sources being consumed

Its survey took place in 2010, which was like another world when it comes to news consumption platforms.

The more contained, or even constrained, a platform feels, the more it can contribute to people feeling less overwhelmed

publishing is like Hollywood — nobody ever does the marketing they promise.

Mr. Mamet is taking advantage of a new service being offered by his literary agency, ICM Partners, as a way to assume more control over the way his book is promoted.

New Publisher Authors Trust: Themselves

When they’re illustrated to better explain, such as showing you how to knit a stitch or make a candle or a piece of jewelry, wouldn’t a video be a better option most of the time?

Books are illustrated for two reasons: beauty or explanatory purpose, more the latter than the former.

But the illustrated books are in the single-digit percentages most of the time, with some of the more successful categories in the very low double-digits.

There’s a final dilemma. Publishers are now paying lower advances, releasing fewer titles and selling digital content at lower prices than print content (which in turn affects royalty payments to both agent and author). Assuming this is the new reality, there will be less money to go around for the number of agents now in business. Plus, will it be worth an agent’s time and energy to sell a project that doesn’t pay more than $1,500 upfront? Probably not. One agency has quietly come out with a new model that requires authors to pay a minimum commission—i.e., the agent must earn a minimum amount on a sale no matter what advance the publisher pays, which means authors would “share” a larger part of the advance upfront (or even pay out of pocket in the case of very low advances). Undoubtedly, there’s no shortage of aspiring writers who would be ecstatic to pay more to an agent if it meant securing a publishing deal. But such a model is sure to raise ethical concerns. Agents may take projects knowing they will ultimately be paid by authors rather than by publishers. Is the industry (that includes the author!) ready to accept such a shift in how agents profit?

The passive voice is weak, vague, and wordy. "New York publishers are being attacked by self-publishers" is not as powerful as "Self-publishers are attacking New York publishers." I search for every instance of "be" and "being" to eliminate as many instances of the passive voice as I can.

hyphenate two or more words used as an adjective—"social-media sites"

bulleted lists should maintain a parallel structure

The industry has long suffered the irony that effective publishing is most evident when invisible; it is only when standards are less than felicitous that we realise how well what we read is managed most of the time.

Gone is our confidence that publishers and agents know exactly what everyone wants to (or should) read

The copy editor, a traditionally marginalised figure, is now in strong demand.

Perhaps the most radical example of this was the World Builder project launched in conjunction with Adam Christopher’s superhero noir novel, Empire State in 2011. The idea was to not just encourage fan art, but to give it the publisher’s seal of approval.

Collaborations between writers and fans are nothing new, but a new wave of projects are revisiting the concept with modern technology

Many editors of literary journals don’t want work that has been published anywhere—even online. Even on a blog. Even on Facebook.

lit mag editors will likely refuse to consider the individual works for publication, citing the fact that they were previously published.

color represents the core of merchandise

presenting colors to the reader

bette

the nine independent publishers who finally took a stand: Abrams Books, Chronicle Books, Grove/Atlantic Inc. Chicago Review Press, Inc, New Directions Publishing Corp., W.W. Norton & Company, Perseus Books Group (where I work), the Rowman & Littlefield Publishing Group, and Workman Publishing.

the independent publishers asserted that, “in aggregate, according to market data published by Nielsen BookScan the independents accounted for approximately 49 percent of total trade book sales nationwide in 2011.” A significant portion of those sales were through Amazon, which is why their decision to challenge the settlement and incur the possible wrath of this retailing giant is cou rageous.

If the agency model is effectively banned, Amazon will have the ability to price whole categories of e-books below cost in a way that is likely to drive out competition from other less deep-pocketed booksellers as well as brick and mortar booksellers.