Group items tagged

HONG KONG — The Associated Press is considering whether to sell news stories to some online customers exclusively for a certain period, perhaps half an hour, the head of the news organization said Tuesday. The AP licenses its stories and photographs to many of the Internet's main hubs, including Google, Yahoo and Microsoft's MSN, and its work also is used by hundreds of Web sites owned by newspapers and broadcasters.

Ficly is a place for playing with story-telling; a collaborative environment where anyone can pick up a narrative thread and weave a prequel or sequel.

A successful example of the Long Tail Theory, Oak Knoll Press, publisher of rare, out of print books, managed to increase its sales this year-despite catering to a niche audience-by focusing on what loyal customers ask for instead of what doesn't sell.

For Google News publishers, getting high placement in Google News can be great. Most publishers would love to see prime time placement of their stories on the main Google News home page, but many settle for ranking well in Google......

Perhaps the most revealing thing about the "Dumb Money" story, in fact, is that everyone involved -- author, agent and publisher -- saw it as an experiment, the kind of small-scale trial run that a late-adopting industry needs to do a lot more of.

Ranking Redundancy: Digg Launches Trending Stories - 11/05/2009

Okay, does anyone besides me find it ironic that by making a kerfluffle about it, more people are going to know about this story than just the publication's original readers? Ironic that a post condemning the (lack of) ethics of a publisher are in some ways exacerbating the original problem.

Interesting story of business model evolution for college textbook rentals. 

Interesting story of business model evolution for college textbook rentals. 

Awesome company. Be sure to check out the Mirasol story. I heard about this technology from a Forbes article on the thinnest, lightest e-reader by Qualcomm. 

A blender that makes smoothies based on fruits trending on Twitter. I think things like this could help publishers think outside the box.Similar to authors who write chapter by chapter and then based on reader comments, continue and develop the story. Digital influence in realtime.

Conventional wisdom says that entrepreneurs who start a Web-based business will do so with VC money. Read enough stories of Internet ventures that enjoy lucrative exits in the millions (in some cases billions) of dollars, and it's easy to assume that the only path to success is to begin by securing deals with investors who are far less interested in helping a start-up build a substantial brand as they are in realizing a return as quickly as possible. Bootstrapping simply isn't sexy anymore. But for many start-up publishers, bootstrapping is a way of life, and VC money isn't an option.

Don't let the math stop you from reading this story about the role of web-mediated collaboration. This is Gutenberg 2.0.

People often credit their ideas to individual "Eureka!" moments. But Steven Johnson shows how history tells a different story. His fascinating tour takes us from the "liquid networks" of London's coffee houses to Charles Darwin's long, slow hunch to today's high-velocity web.

A thoughtful discussion on the root of big ideas and innovation. I found this talk particularly apt to the publishing business and the business model innovations we're currently discussing. "Chance favors the connected mind."

According to Young, changing technology is easy, changing cultural values is another story. Does this explain why readers are slow to embrace the e-book?

Update on the NIH public access story.

More on the Google-AAP settlement. Key take-away ""But content owners also belatedly realize that simply suing consumers who find new, convenient ways to access content online is not as good as finding new business models to profit from customer interest that technology makes possible."

Our boss sent us this article. It shows the impact of the economic crises on the publishing industry. Pretty depressing for us!