Just before I took a holiday from the Internet
for Easter... the news came in that Amazon was acquiring Goodreads.
In the fast world of Publishing Now, you
know the news is big when a week after the announcement the fur...
feathers...hair...are still flying around the blogosphere.
Those that hate all things Amazon are
cursing. Those that love all things Amazon are trying to be calm....
Hugh Howey jumped first with an interesting blog post, which canny Amazon immediately updated their press release to
include. This is a good thing says Howey. He makes a compelling argument for
the merger. (Buy Buttons on Goodreads)
Others are not so sure.
Amazon, with its review problems, (sock
puppetry) became only a buy platform after readers found trustworthy reviews on
Goodreads. So will Goodreads recommendations count for anything in the future?
Laura Hazard Owen of Paid Content put some
compelling questions to Otis Chandler of Goodreads and Russ Grandinetti of Amazon. First Do No Harm....
If you look at the comments... people are
still asking the questions...
Phil Jones from FutureBook wonders whether any of the big 6,5,4, will use Goodreads now? (Like asking Random Penguin to promote Scholastic.)
AmazonGoodreads will be the hot topic for a
while...
Last week I mentioned another hot button
topic, which is still simmering away underneath the AmazonGoodreads marriage, Barnes and Noble dropping Simon and Schuster books. S&S weren’t going to
pay the new fees B&N wanted from publishers to display their books in
stores.
As more information filters out it is
becoming clear that B&N changed their pricing to publishers to reflect the
fact that they are being seen as a showroom.
Go to B&N. Look at the latest book by
your favourite author. Jump onto wifi. Buy it, at a better price, from
somewhere else.
This is the reality now...and how do
bookstores compete with this? And
what happens to the author whose publisher won’t take part in the game? VQR has
a great article on what S&S authors are doing and what authors and publishers should do
when they find themselves in the same situation.
In New Zealand the Hot Button topic is who made it onto the New Zealand Post Children’s Book Awards. Who didn’t and should
have been. And do we really agree with the Judges comment that there are no
feisty girl heroines?
In Craft,
Writer Unboxed have posted their 90 writing tools in a single post.
Chuck Sambuchino has a post on 7 tips for adapting your novel into a screenplay.
KillZone 8 ways to edit suspense and pace into your MS. (craftbook in a single post)
In Marketing,
Lindsay Buroker has been a canny marketer
in the past on Amazon and as the algorithms change she has changed her
marketing plans...to what works now.
To finish,
Following on from the Random House eBook
contract debacle of early March, Dean Wesley Smith wrote one of the most definitive posts on rights reversal clauses in publishing contracts that I have
seen. This is a must read. The comments are a must read. This post is being
shared all around the place.
Writing, Publishing Contracts, Bookstores,
Reviews, Marketing, Awards. All Hot Button issues. Wear gloves. Read at your
own risk.
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