Diamond

For the fourth consecutive year, a highly regarded studies just released from BISG tracks and analyzes the key trends in how students and faculty members acquire, assign, teach, and consume educational content in multiple media formats. Student Attitudes Toward Content in Higher Education, Volume 4, is now available as a digital report alongside a complementary study, Faculty Attitudes Toward Content in Higher Education Volume 3.

Amazon announced it was buying digital application comiXology for an undisclosed amount last week.  The acquisition has vast implications for the future of the comic book industry, from big publishers like Marvel and DC Comics, to independent creators, to the small but ardent network of 2,500 comic book retail stores across America.

Canada’s book publishing market is shrinking. It’s facing competition from online retailers and electronic books that you can read on phones, tablets and dedicated e-readers.

Here’s a sign of the decline. Wiley Canada is suspending its local operations — except for sales and marketing — and centralizing its professional and trade publishing in the United States.

“This is difficult news to deliver and absorb,” said an email last week from long-time Wiley editor Karen Milner, who will lose her job on May 31.

New York, NY, May 8, 2013 – From May 29-30, 2013, the best minds in digital publishing will convene in the Javits Center in New York City for the highly-anticipated, perennially sold-out at IDPF Digital Book 2013 conference (http://idpf.org/db13). This year’s theme, Advancing Publishing in a Digital World, has already drawn an enormous crowd, with seats expected to sell out soon.

Some featured speakers and session insights include:

• Otis Chandler, Co-founder and CEO of Goodreads will share an update and tackle questions from the crowd, including: what’s next for Goodreads now that it’s owned by Amazon? What does the recent sale mean for the 17 million members, 530 million books and 23 million reviews?

• Malcolm Gladwell, bestselling author and staff writer for The New Yorker will speculate on the digital future with Brad Stone, Bloomberg Businessweek writer and author of the upcoming The Everything Store: Jeff Bezos and the Age of Amazon

I know many writers are hesitant to the idea of blogging. It feels like just another social media chore, but nothing can be farther from the truth. In fact, blogging is probably the ONLY form of social media that 1) draws from a writer’s strengths and 2) doesn’t try to fundamentally change our personality.

Yes, as a social media Jedi, I will tell you that it’s a good idea to tweet and learn to use Facebook, but I’m also going to tell you something you already know.

It's that time of the year! Amazon has released its great list of goofy facts about holiday sales . We don't have much to add to this list. It's a fun quick read. Here's the info from Amazon: Holiday Fun Facts Shipping: The last One-Day Prime order that was delivered in time for Christmas was placed on Dec. 22 at 11:59 p.m. PST and shipped to Ballwin, Mo. The item was “The Cook’s Herb Garden,” a book by Jeff Cox and Marie-Pierre Moine.

The first iPod was revealed quietly at a presentation by Steve Jobs on 23 October 2001 and was in stores a month later. The music industry reacted not by examining the successes of P2P and iTunes and working on their own digital music platform, but with DRM (digital rights management), restrictions that attempted to prevent the buyer from copying music.

Beyond the printed book, many opportunities exist for publishers today to repurpose content in various formats and to increase exposure via online search marketing. However, if it is impossible to tag a book for search engine optimization, or adapt a book from a print to an electronic version, without copying, pasting and reformatting 100,000 words, then publishers could waste a significant amount of time and money in pursuit of these opportunities.

If distribution means getting books into the hands of sellers, circulators or readers, then a true profile of the distribution business would cast a wide net, beginning at the binding line and continuing through to the ‘long tail’ of online portals, used bookstores and curbside pushcarts. However, if distribution, from the publisher’s view, means getting books to generate sales revenue, we can overlook all of the aftermarket, recirculation and reselling channels and focus solely on reaching stores, libraries, online and catalog warehouses and—increasingly, thanks to the Internet—direct marketing from the publisher to the consumer. In the article “Deconstructing Distribution,” in Book Business’