I heard a thought-provoking webcast today, offered by the Book Industry Study Group entitled “Digital Books: A New Chapter for Reader Privacy” and presented by an ACLU representative. She spoke of case law that has been passed protecting our reader’s right to privacy, whether that means prohibiting Google Books from recording our thoughtpaths, and subsequently aggregating, archiving, →
Words inscribed on paper form a permanent record of our civilization. Just as a painter controls every brush stroke, a sculptor his chisel, so do authors deliberately choose each word, each signpost pointing to an idea or a thing. A book. A stunning achievement. Sometimes a genius captures in words the Geist of an era. As James →
Someone asked recently in a Book Industry Study Group (BISG) post: “Does anyone else out there, besides me, think that self-publishing should just go away and let ‘real’ publishing take over again?” Interesting question. But I don’t think that the clock will stop while we deliberate, folks. There is no turning back and we are →
More than any other year, 2010 at Frankfurt was one for problem solving, partner finding, and planning practical approaches to the new terrain our industry is moving into. We finally settled on a platform for publishing e-content that seems almost too good to be true: Negligible up-front set-up cost Strong yet flexible DRM Publisher-controlled backend →
We recently spoke to a potential distributor for a series of paper and e-books we are publishing. He said that if we supply printer-ready PDFs and give his company exclusive global rights to distribute our book, they would “push it out” (sounds like sausage!) to 48 leading e-tailers and e-wholesalers, most of whom will take a 50% →
Published in IPNE newsletter, June 2010 A group of fifteen IPNE members visited Harvard Book Store on June 4th, to witness the digital revolution turn yesterday’s “gentleman’s business” of publishing into everyman’s global printing press. The Espresso Book Machine (EBM), squired into reality by Jason Epstein, inventor of the trade paperback book in 1952, has the footprint of a large Xerox machine, featuring →
We at OBS are delighted to announce the publication of Dr. John Morris’s new book “Alone at Sea: Gloucester in the Age of the Dorymen (1623-1939).” This beautifully illustrated book represents some 10 years of research conducted by John as he discovered the now vanished seafaring way of life that claimed his grandfather, a Gloucester doryman who →
Our trip to London Book Fair was scotched because of the Icelandic volcano, cancelling our rights and other business meetings we had scheduled. However, it appears that the once-perceived-to-be-flagging BEA later this month will enjoy a boost in business, as many globally-based companies who couldn’t make the London fair still perceive f2f as the best way to do business, →
Today we sent to the printer our latest book, Dr. John Morris’s Alone at Sea: Gloucester in the Age of the Dorymen (1623-1939) (Commonwealth Editions, Beverly, Mass.). Stunningly beautiful, thoroughly researched, and comprehensive (448 pages with 76 period photographs and maps), the book chronicles America’s premier fishing port during the age of sail — starting with Morris’s →
The interRAI organization, a nonprofit founded in 1994, serves geriatric and disabled populations around the world with their health care instruments for evaluation and assessment of health care. OBS puts our publishing expertise to work in helping populate and manage their internet portal for the new suite of 15 medical publications — manuals and forms for each →