Readium Open Source Initiative Launched to Accelerate EPUB 3 Adoption
PRESS RELEASE
Feb. 13, 2012, 6:45 a.m. EST
The International Digital Publishing Forum (IDPF) today announced the Readium Project, a new open source initiative to develop a comprehensive reference implementation of the IDPF EPUB(R) 3 standard. This vision will be achieved by building on WebKit, the widely adopted open source HTML5 rendering engine.
EPUB, an XML and Web Standards based format developed by the IDPF, has become a key global standard in the rapidly developing digital publishing industry, enabling digital books and publications to be portable across devices and reading systems. EPUB 3, a major revision of the standard, was approved in October 2011 and is available at http://idpf.org/epub/30 . The new version aligns EPUB with HTML5 and adds support for video, audio, interactivity, vertical writing and other global language capabilities, improved accessibility, MathML, and styling and layout enhancements. WebKit is an open source rendering engine for HTML5 and related Web Standards. WebKit is utilized as the underlying engine in many web browsers and applications, including Apple Safari, Google Chrome, Apple iBooks, Adobe AIR(R), Nokia MeeGo(R), HP webOS, and others. Project Readium is focusing on developing a complete reference implementation of EPUB 3 utilizing the WebKit engine. Packaged as a test application for content developers, the Readium codebase will also serve as a steppingstone for commercial reading systems. A proof-of-concept prototype is available now as a Google Chrome browser extension for Windows and Mac OS/X, and the project aims to deliver a feature-complete implementation including an Android(R) configuration by mid-2012.
"Project Readium will significantly accelerate EPUB 3 adoption and increase implementation consistency," said Bill McCoy, Executive Director of the IDPF. "A universal digital publishing format for the open web benefits the entire industry and ultimately consumers, who want the freedom to read on their choice of applications and devices."
Project Readium sponsors and other industry stakeholders welcome this IDPF-sponsored activity (see attached quote sheet). For more information about the project, including how to participate and links to downloads and source code, visit http://readium.org . READ more at: http://www.marketwatch.com/story/readium-open-source-initiative-launched-to-accelerate-epub-3-adoption-2012-02-13
Monday, February 20, 2012
Barnes & Noble profiled by NYT, reveals it's preparing new Nook for spring launch
The publishing industry is in the midst of a massive decline, with sales of physical books dropping year after year, and Borders, the second-largest bookstore chain in the US, closing its doors last summer. The rise of ebooks — and Amazon's Kindle, in particular — has been a major contributing factor, but it's the maker of a popular e-reader that publishers are now pinning their hopes on: Barnes & Noble. In a profile on the company's CEO WIlliam Lynch, the New York Times examines the dynamic currently in play between traditional publishing houses and the retailer. It all comes down to bookstores: publishers view the experience of browsing in a physical location as vital to their future success, and B&N is one of the last major US chains left. "That display space they have in the store is really one of the most valuable places that exists in this country for communicating to the consumer that a book is a big deal," Random House's Madeline McIntosh told the Times. Perhaps even more importantly, it allows publishers to maintain the perceived value of a physical book over the often dramatically discounted prices Amazon and other retailers offer on digital titles.
Lynch agrees on the importance of brick-and-mortar locations, telling the paper that "our stores are not going anywhere," although its unclear what he truly sees as the company's long-term prospects. Lynch was the driving force behind the development of the Nook in 2009, and although Barnes & Noble reported a four-percent increase in physical book sales over the recent holiday season, the CEO has also floated the idea of spinning off the Nook business into its own division. Publishers confirm the Nook currently holds around 27 percent of the ebook market, compared to the 60 percent minimum Amazon garners, and B&N anticipates Nook content sales to become a $750 million business by the end of this year — with international expansion on the horizon. Read more at: http://www.theverge.com/2012/1/29/2755207/publishing-industry-barnes-noble-amazon
Lynch agrees on the importance of brick-and-mortar locations, telling the paper that "our stores are not going anywhere," although its unclear what he truly sees as the company's long-term prospects. Lynch was the driving force behind the development of the Nook in 2009, and although Barnes & Noble reported a four-percent increase in physical book sales over the recent holiday season, the CEO has also floated the idea of spinning off the Nook business into its own division. Publishers confirm the Nook currently holds around 27 percent of the ebook market, compared to the 60 percent minimum Amazon garners, and B&N anticipates Nook content sales to become a $750 million business by the end of this year — with international expansion on the horizon. Read more at: http://www.theverge.com/2012/1/29/2755207/publishing-industry-barnes-noble-amazon
Ebook sales are being driven by downmarket genre fiction
Publishers face secrecy over sales and an absence of industry-wide data to help them plot strategy
Kindle-owning bibliophiles are furtive beasts. Their shelves still boast classics and Booker winners. But inside that plastic case, other things lurk. Sci-fi and self-help. Even paranormal romance, where vampires seduce virgins and elves bonk trolls.
The ebook world is driven by so-called genre fiction, categories such as horror or romance. It's not future classics that push digital sales, but more downmarket fare. No cliche is left unturned, no adjective underplayed. At the time of writing, the bestselling Amazon Kindle book was Asylum Harbor, by Traci Hohenstein. Crime sells. Try a sample, I dare you. In digital, dross rises. But does this have implications for publishers' decision-making, as we increasingly migrate?
One of the problems publishers face in setting strategy is the absence of industry-wide data on ebook sales. Amazon, the dominant player, is secretive with its numbers. As the company revealed its mixed results for 2011 last week, all its UK division would say was that ebook sales over the past three months were up five-fold on the equivalent period last year. No actual data.
Amazon has started supplying data to Nielsen BookData in the US for the Wall Street Journal's bestseller lists, but the information is limited. UK publishers know their own genre titles do best as Amazon tells them this privately; across the industry there is nothing to go on.
A study in the US last year by Publishers Weekly and Bowker found that literary fiction outsold all forms of genre fiction, winning 20% of market share. But this figure includes classics. Most new Kindle owners buy an avalanche of classics in their initial excitement. All of Trollope for £1.99! All of Dickens for £3! But are they actually read? The genre of sci-fi came in at 19% and Christian fiction, God help us, third, at 16%. Continue reading at: http://www.guardian.co.uk/media/2012/feb/05/ebook-sales-downmarket-genre
Kindle-owning bibliophiles are furtive beasts. Their shelves still boast classics and Booker winners. But inside that plastic case, other things lurk. Sci-fi and self-help. Even paranormal romance, where vampires seduce virgins and elves bonk trolls.
The ebook world is driven by so-called genre fiction, categories such as horror or romance. It's not future classics that push digital sales, but more downmarket fare. No cliche is left unturned, no adjective underplayed. At the time of writing, the bestselling Amazon Kindle book was Asylum Harbor, by Traci Hohenstein. Crime sells. Try a sample, I dare you. In digital, dross rises. But does this have implications for publishers' decision-making, as we increasingly migrate?
One of the problems publishers face in setting strategy is the absence of industry-wide data on ebook sales. Amazon, the dominant player, is secretive with its numbers. As the company revealed its mixed results for 2011 last week, all its UK division would say was that ebook sales over the past three months were up five-fold on the equivalent period last year. No actual data.
Amazon has started supplying data to Nielsen BookData in the US for the Wall Street Journal's bestseller lists, but the information is limited. UK publishers know their own genre titles do best as Amazon tells them this privately; across the industry there is nothing to go on.
A study in the US last year by Publishers Weekly and Bowker found that literary fiction outsold all forms of genre fiction, winning 20% of market share. But this figure includes classics. Most new Kindle owners buy an avalanche of classics in their initial excitement. All of Trollope for £1.99! All of Dickens for £3! But are they actually read? The genre of sci-fi came in at 19% and Christian fiction, God help us, third, at 16%. Continue reading at: http://www.guardian.co.uk/media/2012/feb/05/ebook-sales-downmarket-genre
Two more giant retailers join boycott of books published by Amazon
Maybe it’s an instance of live by the sword, die by the sword: After years of ruthlessly battering retailers with relentless and drastic predatory pricing,Amazon finds its foray into book publishing being greeted by a wide-scale and growing retailer boycott.
Late Friday, just days after the country’s biggest brick-and-mortar chain,Barnes & Noble, announced it would not sell books published by Amazon because its “actions have undermined the industry as a whole” (see our earlier report), two more giant chains announced they were joining the boycott: the 200+ stores of the country’s second biggest bookseller chain,Books-A-Million (BAM), and Canada’s number one book retailer, Chapters Indigo.
BAM seems not to have released a statement but rather made the announcement via a phone call to Publishers Weekly, which in turn broke the news with a one-sentence report that notes only that the boycott includes books published by Amazon’s “beard” imprint at Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, New Harvest. (See our earlier report.) There’s no indication the company made any further statement about its action. Read more at: http://mhpbooks.com/48881/two-more-giant-retailers-join-boycott-of-books-published-by-amazon/
Late Friday, just days after the country’s biggest brick-and-mortar chain,Barnes & Noble, announced it would not sell books published by Amazon because its “actions have undermined the industry as a whole” (see our earlier report), two more giant chains announced they were joining the boycott: the 200+ stores of the country’s second biggest bookseller chain,Books-A-Million (BAM), and Canada’s number one book retailer, Chapters Indigo.
BAM seems not to have released a statement but rather made the announcement via a phone call to Publishers Weekly, which in turn broke the news with a one-sentence report that notes only that the boycott includes books published by Amazon’s “beard” imprint at Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, New Harvest. (See our earlier report.) There’s no indication the company made any further statement about its action. Read more at: http://mhpbooks.com/48881/two-more-giant-retailers-join-boycott-of-books-published-by-amazon/
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)