HarperCollins Appoints Editor for Digital Content Category

HarperCollins has been a recognized leader in digital publishing; last year, it was named Book Business' Publishing Innovator of the Year for its leadership in digital innovation. So it's not too suprising that the publishing giant, a division of Rupert Murdoch's News Corp., announced Monday that it has appointed a new editorial director of its digital publishing sector, a first for a publishing house, according to a story in Crain's New York Business.

Margot Schupf, an associate publisher who previously was the editorial director for Rodale, has been appointed to the newly created position for the Morrow/Avon/Eos group consisting of William Morrow's hardcover fiction and nonfiction, Avon's women's romance paperbacks and Eos' science fiction.

Schupf's responsibilities will now include devising new e-books, reviving the backlist through new opportunities, as well as working alongside the marketing department to introduce the company's digital content through cutting-edge digital tools.

“I thought it would be interesting to come at e-books from a content perspective. A lot of people are coming at it from a marketing and distribution perspective,” Schupf told Crain's New York Business.

According to Crain's, Both Schupf and Liate Stehlik, publisher of the group, see the newly created position as an experiment—which, if successful, will expand to the larger HarperCollins division.