China: eBooks, Writers, And Writing

Something’s happening over there. I’m just not sure what or how right now. So these links for later.

Report: Qidian Founder Arrested, Ugly Rumors May Implicate Shanda, Tencent

iFanr/Google English: Network literature changes: pattern, channels and author are in the innovation eco-

Google English: Biography founder Lolli start commercial bribery detainees suspected war grand Tencent

Shanda Interactive Entertainment Limited

Shanda Snags Success

Shanda Literature: Making Money from Copyright

Wikipedia: Shanda and Guo Jingming

Another Book Publishing Mafia Member Falls

Penguin pays $75 million to settle US eBook price-fixing case ahead of Apple’s June trial

The Attorney General also confirmed the settlement earlier today, noting that the investigations and resulting litigation has recovered in the region of $164 million so far.

Boldfaced emphasis added be me.

One hundred and sixty-four million dollars.

I wonder if that even wipes out the collusive profits they made?

Apple thinks it’s invincible.

But it will fall next.

Why?

Google Pimps Play eBooks

Which is a waste of marketing dollars. What are they really selling here? eBooks or a tablet? Why no mention of the Google Play Store? Why no link to just the damn eBooks?

Quote: Kristine Kathryn Rusch

The Business Rusch: The Death of Publishing

You’re a rotating group of widgets that might make the publisher some money.

That’s the truth.

And she also explains why the print bastards haven’t yet died — and nearly convinces me.

eBillions Of eBooks

Amazon.com Announces Fourth Quarter Sales up 22% to $21.27 Billion

Jeff Bezos honks:

We’re now seeing the transition we’ve been expecting. After 5 years, eBooks is a multi-billion dollar category for us and growing fast — up approximately 70% last year. In contrast, our physical book sales experienced the lowest December growth rate in our 17 years as a book seller, up just 5%. We’re excited and very grateful to our customers for their response to Kindle and our ever expanding ecosystem and selection.

Boldfaced emphasis added by me.

Just five years for that to happen.

And Bezos was expecting it.

While the Big Six/Four clutched their pearls and did nothing.

What were they expecting? Illegal collusion to save them?

Wake up, move fast, or die.

Amazon’s Market Obesity

Amazon May Already Have Reached 50% Market Share of the U.S. Fiction Book Market Across All Formats

The amazing thing would be that, in three waves of about half a dozen years each, Amazon would have completed a total transformation of the U.S. publishing and bookselling business. (Only the third wave, of course, has been strictly about ebooks.) And for better or worse, that transformation is a game-changer in every sector of publishing and bookselling activity including, of course, the activities of authors and readers.

And who is to “blame” for this?

The stupidity of the Big Six (soon to be Four), period.

And Bookish remains in perpetual private beta.

Will Amazon “AutoRip” Print Books Too?

I know the meme is to answer every headline that ends in a question mark with the word, No. So shut up.

Amazon’s “AutoRip” Service Goes Live, Giving Customers Free MP3s For CDs Purchased On Amazon As Far Back As 1998 (Hands On)

Amazon is today introducing a new service called Amazon AutoRip, which automatically gives customers free MP3 versions of any CDs they’ve purchased from Amazon since the launch of its Music Store back in 1998.

If Amazon was able to get the music industry to agree to that — and they are no pushovers — how soon will it happen with DVDs/Blu-Ray Discs? (Hello, Ultraviolet!)

And then printed books?

For all of you print fetishists who have long brayed about bundling an eBook with a printed book, here’s a solution that finally makes some damn sense.

And if that happened, my prior post would seem more plausible as the next step too: How Amazon Could Switch Over ePub Book Buyers

And What About Your Free Kindle Book?

Using Statistics to Plan New Editorial

In the U.S., it is estimated, of the books printed that do get sold to individuals, 95 percent are never read.

You’ve given away a thousand copies of your Kindle book for free.

So what?

How many were actually read?

Previously here:

What Are Kindle Sample Conversion Rates?

The Casual Vacancy Already Pirated

Fraud All The Way Down In eBooks

New York Times: The Best Book Reviews Money Can Buy

In the fall of 2010, Mr. Rutherford started a Web site, GettingBookReviews.com. At first, he advertised that he would review a book for $99. But some clients wanted a chorus proclaiming their excellence. So, for $499, Mr. Rutherford would do 20 online reviews. A few people needed a whole orchestra. For $999, he would do 50.

There were immediate complaints in online forums that the service was violating the sacred arm’s-length relationship between reviewer and author. But there were also orders, a lot of them. Before he knew it, he was taking in $28,000 a month.

A polite fellow with a rakish goatee and an entrepreneurial bent, Mr. Rutherford has been on the edges of publishing for most of his career. Before working for the self-publishing house, he owned a distributor of inspirational books. Before that, he was sales manager for a religious publishing house. Nothing ever quite worked out as well as he hoped. With the reviews business, though, “it was like I hit the mother lode.”

Boldfaced emphasis added by me.

I wonder if it turns out that there’s more money in selling reviews than in self-publishing.—
Baldur Bjarnason (@fakebaldur) August 26, 2012