Grub Street Printing Newsletter #75, July 2015

The New Kindle Royalty System

Beginning this month, self published Kindle ebook authors will be paid not for the “sale” of their ebook, but for the total number of pages readers have actually read of their title. Apparently books sold by regular ebook publishers will retain the traditional payment based on sales system.

Top Cities for Books (even eBooks!)

Using Amazon data, a list of the top five book buying cities in America showed that Washington DC bought the most ink and paper books while Seattle the most books (conventional and eBook). The data was for cities of 500,000 people or more.

Amazon Most Trusted Retailer

Amazon founder Jeff Bezos has always focused on keeping the customer satisfied. Apparently he's doing a good job as Amazon tops the list of reputable retailers for the third consecutive year.

Another Survey Favors Ink and Paper

After working in the book industry for so long I often wonder if my prejudice blinds me to the world of pixels, but survey after survey reports people comprehend information better and are more relaxed reading ink on paper material.

Kickstarter Funds Bath Books

Bibliobath raised over $10,000 to refine and market their bath-time friendly books made with waterproof (no trees) paper, ink and binding, filling a need I wasn't even aware of.

Greenpeace Re-engages

The Asia Pulp and Paper Group has announced that Greenpeace will resume its role of enabling APP to enact and maintain its Forest Conservation Policy. APP operates in Indonesia and China and produces over 19 million tons of paper annually.

Independent vs Publisher Issued in $ and ¢

The playing field has changed quickly in the last decade and many of the truisms I believed in no longer apply when deciding to go through a publisher or producing your title independently.

Inkjet Book Production

Apparently this decade old technology may be about to take off. Book manufacturers believe digital inkjet economies have the potential to replace toner based POD book production.

Blockbuster Dies While Indies Thrive

Debunking the logic that reasons printed media outlets (ie. Bookstores) will go the way of the video media rental outlets (ie. Blockbuster), the current trend is a resurgence in book sales and new book sellers.

More On Adult Coloring Books

As reported in May's newsletter, coloring books for grown-ups are taking off. Now Marvel is releasing three coloring books featuring their super heroes, such as Captain America and Iron Man squaring off on opposite sides of the Civil War. Try to stay inside the lines, okay?

No Blues for the Greys

The new Grey title, which tells Christian's (of Fifty Shades fame) side of events, followed the success of the trilogy by selling 1.1 million copies out of the gate and has locked in plans for its third, fourth and fifth printings.

What Millenials Buy

A 2015 survey taken in the UK shows millenials the least likely generation to read eBooks. For the general population, dedicated eReaders are owned by just 41% of the population, but considering all devices on which an eBook can be read, 83% of those surveyed had a smartphone and 71% owned a tablet.

Final Thought

“Please, no matter how we advance technologically, please don't abandon the book. There is nothing in our material world more beautiful than the book." Patti Smith

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Archived Newsletters are at http://grubstreetnews.blogspot.com/

Grub Street printing Newsletter #74, June 2015

After a year or two in the book making business I ran into a page of copy I'd never seen before. It was entitled Colophon. My mentor, and friend, Patrick explained that a colophon was just a way to communicate significant information about the book including, but not limited to, the typeface, the name of the designer, the typesetter, the date of publication, the stock that was used for the text and cover, the printer, the binder and even the run length.

Often the Acknowledgment page in the front matter carries the burden of identifying and acknowledging the assistance of others that contributed to the book's creation. But about the time the husband and children are being appreciated for their patience, I think something more formal might be more appropriate at times.

Perhaps adding a colophon to most trade paper titles may seem a bit much. The first book I printed with a colophon was a museum catalog for an upcoming show of the WPA Artists at the University of Michigan Art Museum. It was a well designed, classy job cover to cover. And right there, at the end of the book, with all the designers, editors, and paper stocks was our company name.

Do you think everyone in the plant paid special attention to that title as its production moved through their departments?

Deciding what titles would benefit from the addition of a colophon is difficult. Generally I think literature and art books would be the most common but non-fiction books that meet exceptional levels of content, manufacture and materials could acknowledge an array of editorial and structural providers.

I collect a lot of books and admit even most of the dustier ones lack a colophon, and the newer ones don't reveal much except they were done in Asia.

It's too bad.

Generally when printing offset books the page count involves adding a blank page or two in the back meaning page count and price wouldn't be affected by adding a colophon page.

Let''s be honest. You know all the time spent designing your book, selecting text stocks, involving a trusted printer, etc. sets your book apart from others in the field.

Perhaps the addition of a colophon would not only acknowledge the craftsmanship involved in it's production, but also inform the reader how the successful design was rendered.

Selling What You Don't Own

Exactly what constitutes the purchase of an ebook remains in question, at least overseas. Dutch courts ruled that consumers can sell “software rights” and so Dutch bookseller Tom Kabinet offers second hand ebooks, upsetting the major Dutch publishers who have responded with a flurry of lawsuits.

Scrabble Pros take Note

As word and word usage evolves, it gets harder and harder to keep up with. The final arbiter on all Scrabble game words has just accepted around 6,500 new words. That's over 10% of a college graduates entire vocabulary.

Independent Bookstores on the Rise

It's heartening that the number of independent American bookstores is up 27% in the past five years. All better? Well, tiny little France supports more independents than the entire U.S.

Amazon Controls Your Books

When Audible (owned by Amazon) upgraded his app for listening to his books on his iPhone, this writer realized that by “buying” all his books from Amazon, he not only didn't own his books, he couldn't even control how he used them. Their football, their rules I guess.

Amazon and Audible Dictate Terms

Amazon has been unable to finalize a contract with the last of the big 5 publishers, Penguin Random House. Will it use the same “freeze out” it used against Hachette last year to force Penguin's hand? Meanwhile, its subsidiary Audible is attempting to force German publishers to accept a new contract by threatening to stop offering their audio titles on Amazon.

# is Popular

Oxford University Press reviewed 500 words to find the most frequently used new word by children/youth authors. That would be hashtag.

Thriving Bookstores...in Asia

For whatever reason, this is the second article I've posted about bookstores open past midnight and packed with customers all the while. This store is in Tokyo, the former mention was a store in Taiwan. I can't speak to the cultural differences, but I approve...and am a little jealous.

The Future of Scholarly/Academic Publishing

The world of scholarly journals has totally changed since I worked on Scripta Technica titles thirty five years ago. Paper and ink is on the decline, and large publishers like Elsevier, Taylor and Francis, and Wiley and Sons have come to dominate the field. Can the authors and researchers regain control? Is open access the solution?

The Changing Paper Market

Some domestic paper mills are booming, just not the ones that make the paper for your books. Just as the American paper manufactures have adapted to cleaner, more efficient technologies, the third world manufacturers have built brand new highly efficient, automated mills. Unfortunately, serial deforestation and poached rain forest pulp is all too common no matter how modern the factory.

DRM, the UK and eBooks

British publishers have successfully prosecuted foreign online booksellers (including Virgin Media and Sky) for copyright violations of eBooks or eBook content. The sites purportedly have over 10 million eBook titles available on their web sites.

Final Thoughts

It wasn't until I started reading and found books they wouldn't let us read in school that I discovered you could be insane and happy and have a good life without being like everybody else. ― John Waters

Grub Street Printing Newsletter #73, May 2015

The loss of the typesetting industry happened without much notice. A lot of publishers, especially those entering the field post-Y2K, probably think typesetters were just glorified typists anyway. The welcome embrace of desk top publishing twenty years ago let authors and publishers do all the prep work themselves. The loss of the typesetting industry happened without much notice. A lot of publishers, especially those entering the field post-Y2K, probably think typesetters were just glorified typists anyway. The welcome embrace of desk top publishing twenty years ago let authors and publishers do all the prep work themselves.

“And this is the purpose of typography: The arrangement of design elements within a given structure should allow the reader to easily focus on the message, without slowing down the speed of his reading.”      Hermann Zapf

But a primary function of book typography was designing the book…the entire book. Cover design comes to mind but that was generally handed over to a staff graphic designer. The nuts and bolts of good design involved typeface and font size. Aside from aesthetics, which is reason enough, good design has a number of unexpected benefits, whether it’s for a printed book or an ereader.

The typeface for the text needed to be chosen and then a size in “points” specified. The space between the lines of type was “leading” and that needed to be appropriately considered.  If the designer called for Garamond 8/6 it meant that the font would be 8 point and the leading would be 6 point. Kerning, the space between the letters, could be adjusted.

 Chapter openings presented a wide array of options. Would the chapter title be in the same typeface or would a different face be better? How low should the title drop and then how low will the text drop beneath the title? Would all chapters open recto, meaning some verso pages would be blank?

Where would the folios go? Head or foot, left, right or centered? Again, would another typeface enhance the folios and what size would it be?

Would running head or feet enable the reader to browse the book? More typeface questions. And what about margins? Classic design would say push the text up toward the head and in toward the spine, but how much? Today’s default is center the text on the page. Would that look better?

I published a book some time ago and I can honestly say I considered almost none of these things…and compared to professionally designed books, you can tell.

Type is such a basic and integral part of book production that I’m trying to at least

understand the who, what, where, when and how of type design and usage.

The history begins with early cave paintings, then Egyptian hieroglyphics that morphed from representational art to standardized characters in the shape of objects, then to forms that abstractly defined objects and finally to shapes that described a sound rather than an object. 

The difference in the terms typeface and font is subtle. In the 15th century, metal type was sorted and stored in a box called a font. You might have Times Roman in one box, Times Roman bold in another, and Times Roman light in yet another. Each box contained a different font, but taken all together, they are fonts in the Times Roman typeface.  Stacking all the Times Roman boxes together would describe a font family, the design that identifies them as Times Roman is the typeface.

 During the modern era of typography and printing, the terms uppercase and lowercase evolved because capital letters were stored in a type case usually stored above a case of small letters. The cases were physically different to take advantage of the size difference between the two. Prior to letterpress typesetting, uppercase letters were termed “majuscule” while lower case were “minuscule”.

Unfortunately, today typeface selection has devolved to the point that there are basically just two faces that are used in the majority of printed matter. Out of many thousand fonts, we use Times (serif) and Arial (sans serif). That’s it.

The ability to more easily design modern typefaces has led to an explosion of creative type design. It’s not uncommon for a publication or business to have a unique typeface created for their use.

Did you know that all of the Inter State road signs in America use the same typeface, one that was specifically designed for that purpose? It’s called Clearview Hwy. The story of how the specifications were written and how the designers developed it describes an unusual situation of creating a face for one and only one usage.

“In a badly designed book, the letters mill and stand like starving horses in a field. In a book designed by rote, they sit like stale bread and mutton on the page. In a well-made book, where designer, compositor and printer have all done their jobs, no matter how many thousands of lines and pages, the letters are alive. They dance in their seats. Sometimes they rise and dance in the margins and aisles.”
― Robert Bringhurst, The Elements of Typographic Style

Just for the heck of it, try using a different typeface than Times or Arial, but please, not Comic Sans, a face that’s universally reviled on the typography web sites.

This month’s newsletter is set in Book Antiqua.

Apple Evades Oversight

In its bid to be the final arbiter of all things digital, Apple has been uncooperative with those charged with measuring Apple's compliance with court ordered anti-trust monitoring. Shocker!

Scribd Takes on Audio Subscriptions

Last November Scribd jumped into subscription audio books with 30,000 titles that could be streamed or downloaded for $8.99 per month, which also included full ebook access. Penguin Random House just added 9,000 of their titles to Scribd's list including Game of Thrones and Fifty Shades of Grey, making 45,000 titles available, way more than Kindle Unlimited's offerings.

UK Indy Bookstores Disappear like Pubs

Public houses (pubs) have been closing in the UK for years. Apparently the village bookstore is about to face the same fate.

Children's Print Book Sales Climb

Another market that remains vibrant in traditional book sales is the children's market which continues to show spirited growth in numerous countries.

Improbable Libraries

Like baseball, banjos and saxophones, America claims credit for the first lending libraries. The role of libraries continues to be stretched and redefined by offering the world's knowledge to everyone.

Coloring Books Take Off (Whaaaat?)

Amazon's best selling book is a coloring book ...for grown-ups. I'm not sure I understand this craze but I'm glad that folks are buying paper and ink books.

Canada's Clueless Bus Driver

This is either the nanny society on steroids, a school bus driver who's a control freak, or a very illiterate driver who can't comprehend why someone would sit quietly on a school bus and read. Canadian authorities are too polite to say which it is.

Kobo Uses Value to Fight Kindle

Kobo designed their new Glo reader by listening to die-hard book lovers. It reads more like a book, outperforms the base Kindle and costs $70 less.

January Book Sales Up, Except for eBooks

While trade book sales climbed over year ago numbers, ebook sales declined 10% in January.

 

Banana, Milk, Sugar, Kobo and Cheerios

While there's no toy in the box, 8.4 million Cheerios consumers will get free access to nine different ebooks via BookShout.

Kindle Does Marketing eBooks

I have no idea why Kindle publishing an ebook featuring Land Rovers is worthy of breathless headlines. Didn't any millennials work in the industry before Kindles? What's next? They're already awash in CEO autobiographies.

Kindle Unlimited Payments Shrink Again

While Kindle Unlimited's customer base grew again, payouts to publishers/authors have continued to shrink.

UK Publishers Prosper. Authors? Not So Much.

While UK austerity moves are more rhetoric than policy at this point, UK publishers continue to throttle authors' paychecks despite the fact that they're earning a tidy sum, thank you.

Wall Street Notices B&N

While many were busy writing Barnes & Noble's obituary, things there improved while we weren't watching. In the past two years it paid off its debt, tightened up financial controls and brought Samsung in as a partner in developing the new Nook. Has its demise been canceled or postponed?

Final Thought

If all printers were determined not to print anything till they were sure it would offend nobody, there would be very little printed. Benjamin Franklin

Newsletter # 71, March 2015

My best English teacher in high school frequently remarked that the entire literary world was turned upside down by the introduction of inexpensive paperback novels. The class yawned as one. Paperback books were all we could afford. Our experience with hard cover books was mostly limited to text books which were expensive and heavy. A simple market disruption, right?

Later in life I began making paperback books, roughly at a time midway between their introduction in the mid 1930s and these present days, so the evolution of the paperback has finally become a subject of some interest to me.

And it turns out that it was much more than a simple market disruption.

My birth occurred during the succinctly named Post War arts movement, and that describes not only what the world had been up to, but also the freedom of knowing that the war had ended and lives could be picked up, dusted off, and even reinvented.

As a card-carrying Baby-Boomer I also know that we Boomers were born into a golden time in arts, science, and prosperity. Our parents survived the Great Depression, the first globe encircling kill-fest, and sat down with a beer in their brand new house in the suburbs and said, “The world is a better place. Let's have some kids.”

And here we are.

We were born into a world that created a new theatrical art form, the performers on stage much larger than life, not only speaking over a musical background, but displayed gloriously in something called Technicolor. Cars were no longer black or olive-drab with sputtery 4 cylinder engines; they were two-tone, even three tone sparkling behemoths designed to resemble new-fangled fighter jets, sporting snarling V8 engines. Weekly magazines glowed on the racks with pictures from anywhere and everywhere in the world with realism that pulled the reader into the moment. Colorful, modern design washed over us.

As part of the major design trends of those days, paperback books with graphic, sometimes lurid, sultry, or macabre covers were waiting for the GIs when they returned home. These wonders of mid-century graphic design perfectly describe their time, the cultural evolution that created them, shaped by technological advances, improved educational systems, and employment that provided not only discretionary income but also provided leisure time.

It was technology that allowed the chap books of the mid 17^th century to become dime novels that began the 20^th century. Then with the print industry transitioning to better production methods (photo-lithography), better paper at a better price (enamel stocks print sharper color) and efficient new binding systems (soft cover books), a revolution in book publishing,

marketing and design was under way during the time between the wars.

In 1935, Allen Lane left as head of the London publisher Bodley Head to single-handedly establish Penguin Books, publishing literature in an affordable soft cover binding that sold for roughly what a pack of cigarettes cost. His gamble was so successful that for decades Penguin was a synonym of paperback.

Aware of the success of Lane's venture, Simon & Schuster created the Pocket Books imprint in 1939 headed by Robert deGraff, who immediately issued The Grapes of Wrath as a 25¢ soft cover, versus the $2.75 it took to purchase the hardcover.

Penguin then brought in Ian Ballantine, a grad student from the London School of Economics, to establish the Penguin brand in the United States, but the books they offered were reprints of

their English editions with the covers changed to reflect domestic pricing from pounds to dollars.

DeGraff had plunged right in with graphic covers on Pocket Books from day one, forcing Ballantine to surreptitiously begin to redesign the Penguin classics with new splashy covers to compete.

When Lane later discovered the altered covers bearing his company's name, Ballantine left to establish Bantam Books in 1945 and the three way race to American paperback dominance was on.

This new format probably could not have prospered using cover designs found on hard cover dust jackets. Publishers sold the profitable hardcovers to their traditional book audience, more attuned to works of accomplished writers and who stored their books in cases that lined the walls of their parlor, while the paperback was purchased by readers that just wanted a good read.

Who were these new readers?

Some attribute the birth of this audience as the product of an improved educational system. Literacy climbed rapidly in the first half of the 20^th century.

But Uncle Sam also had a role in the explosion of this seemingly new market. Beginning in 1943, the Army and Navy began giving away what would ultimately amount to 123,000,000 books to their forces stationed around the globe. While established literary titles were in the mix, the soldiers preferred the mysteries, westerns and comedies.

Even better, pre-war, most books were sold only in bookstores, but two out of

every three counties in America had no bookstore at all. Paperbacks, on the other hand, sold in racks at the local drugstore, grocery store, rail and bus terminals, even gas stations and restaurants. The country was suddenly awash in books.

Competing for sales meant designing covers that had instant appeal, that caught the eye while the display rack was slowly turning. This is the genesis not only of a golden age of graphic artists and designers, but the basis for many a collection of these wonderful books with covers that ran the gamut of outrageous to grotesque.

Ultimately, paperback covers acquired manners. Covers were tamed and having a collection of paperbacks no longer painted one as a literary mutant obsessed with all things seamy or violent. Only the Harlequin romance novels continued to highlight low bodices and passionate embraces.

It's a different time now. The graphic designers I've worked with earnestly study the text for a sense of the story that they can translate into something appropriate.

Where once the front cover of the book on the rack helped to sell the book, Borders and Barnes & Noble (and their regional clones) displayed 90% of their stocked titles in book cases with only the spine exposed. And yes, designers vied to design books with eye-catching spines.

I'm not sure I even see a need to design a cover for an ebook. While there are any number of web sites willing to design one for a price, an ebook cover is to a paper and ink book cover as a CD jewel case cover insert is to a vinyl LP album cover: similar but without a “Wow!”.

More efficient perhaps, but it makes the collecting of old paperbacks with brash, exciting covers all the more enjoyable. They are unique to my time, when I came of age hiding paperbacks from my parents, no matter how innocent the content.

They are a symbol, like flames painted on a deuce coupe, Elvis sinfully gyrating on the Ed Sullivan show, brush cuts grown long and shaggy, miniskirts that announced you were not a bobbysoxer, and the grief and anger that exploded when America's youngest President was assassinated. They not only baptized us, but marked us as a generation that acknowledged no boundaries.

And we're still here.

Additional sites show-casing these incredible covers:

Covers featuring women

Bantam Book covers in chronological order

10 of the “best” paperback covers

Ever popular reefer madness covers

Graphic paperback covers with historical perspective

Classic novels with re-imagined covers

Very Sad but Not Surprising

Islamic militants in Iraq looted and destroyed over 2,000 books from the Central Library of Mosul, leaving only Muslim texts on the shelves. Two years ago, the library at Timbuktu was torched by Muslim insurgents but locals had already smuggled the rarest and oldest texts to safety. You know you're backing the wrong side when ignorance becomes a goal.

TPP and Copyrights

As details of the controversial and extremely polarizing Trans Pacific Partnership (TPP) begin to surface, universal imposition of the ridiculous American copyright enforcement period has many nations threatening to walk away from the “secret” negotiations. Thanks, Sonny Bono.

Designing with Fonts & Text

General rules for using type and fonts aren't set in stone so don't be afraid to experiment. However, I still find the current use of sans serif fonts in magazines a pain, especially when the type is reversed to white.

Rare Books Left to Princeton

A family's rare book collection begun 150 years ago has been bequeathed to Princeton University. The collection included six editions of the Gutenberg Bible and was estimated to be worth $300 million.

Speaking of Covers

In the throes of a neurotic, digital ecstasy, a Dutch designer has created a book cover that “reads” the facial expression of the person holding it and then decides whether or not to allow itself to be opened and read. The Dutch seem to have sooo much time on their hands.

Jet.com Opens This Month

The biggest threat to Amazon.com that you never heard of, jet.com, has raised $600 million from investors and intends to open in March. It will compete by using local stores to fill its orders, eliminating warehousing and freight costs. Founder Marc Lore is a former Amazon exec.

Libraries at Airports

I'm surprised that no one ever thought of this before: put lending libraries in big airports. They offer everything from paper and ink books to ebooks, musical CDs, even DVDs and they have been generally very well received.

They Smell so Good

Apparently there are readers who resist ebooks simply because they don't smell like anything but plastic. One of the joys I had in the shop was watching publishers open that first carton of books, close their eyes and inhale deeply. Leave it to the folks at Abe Books to tell us why books smell so darn good.

Le Morte d'Archie

This June, issue #666 of Archie Comics will be the last after over seventy years of publication. Archie may return in a new comic book serial, but its content and design are just in the planning stages. Life with Archie folded last year with issue #36.

Happy Birthday, New Yorker

The New Yorker magazine is celebrating 90 years of publishing. Nine original covers by New Yorker artists will be used on the special edition which became available late in February, each

featuring a different take on their monocled mascot. Even Amazon is joining the celebration with a new series entitled The New Yorker Presents.

Family Christian Stores Bankrupt

The largest Christian chain bookstore with 266 stores in 36 states has declared bankruptcy to reorganize. Family Christian said debt that had accumulated during the recession needed to be renegotiated.

Final thoughts

“I am eternally grateful for my knack of finding in great books, some of them very funny books, reason enough to feel honored to be alive, no matter what else might be going on.” Kurt Vonnegut

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Archived Newsletters are at http://grubstreetnews.blogspot.com/

Grub Street Printing Newsletter #70, February 2015

For some reason I always assumed that part of aging meant developing a certain cynicism to the machinations of our ever changing world. I assumed that time would imbue us each with a “Been there, done that” attitude.

When I was much younger I fully embraced the spirit of the old Dylan tune The Times They Are A-Changing since, like most boomers, I was raised to believe change meant progress which in turn meant things continually improved. The future I envisioned in the 1950s and 1960s had more food, less pollution, more equality, less war, cooler cars, zippier airplanes, cures for all diseases and the Tigers winning the World Series year after year. Now I appreciate that change just means something is different than it was, for better or also for worse.

And therein lie the roots of my cynicism.

Trying to separate the wheat of progress from the chaff of change seems more difficult each year. And whereas once my belief was that all movement was forward movement, I've come to understand that even true progress is burdened with the kind of compromise that inspired the saying, “Two steps forward, and one step back”.

The open arms embrace of all things digital is a case in point. Not the hardware itself, of course, but the mischievous, even malevolent bytes that have crept into the zeroes and ones that move the world.

Our first signs of evil arrived when the internet was new; Alta Vista was the big name in search, and something called a virus somehow migrated into into your system, a gift from someone unknown, for reasons unknown.

Then one day the viruses came of age as hackers and hucksters planted worms, crumbs, PUPs, and Trojan horses into your system to do everything from spy on your every keystroke to disrupting your computer with some bad code so that you'd need to purchase the correct $29.95 antidote they just happened to know you needed.

The digital paradise was lost.

Today, the fifty shades of mischief aren't solely concentrated on mayhem and petty theft, but some are courtesy of a few of the biggest names in the stock market. They argue that their intentions are honorable, their means only marginally invasive. Even better, some innocently ask for permission to poke their nose into your business. Just to enhance your experience, don't you know.

One of my first caution flags was raised some years ago when I was watching an ad on television for Progressive Insurance featuring their gal Flo preaching the benefits of letting Progressive monitor your driving by plugging a device called Snapshot into your car. “No way will anyone be stupid enough to let them plug one of those into their car,” I chortled. And while my gut feeling that evil is afoot is shared by other cynics, a group of young whippersnappers calling themselves “Millennials” could care less if their every driving maneuver is tracked and recorded by a corporation that has a vested interest in taking as much of their money as they can get away with while returning the least amount possible when circumstances require their payment.

Now I find out that as of last year “black boxes” are required in all new cars. These boxes begin recording data when they sense potentially hazardous situations by tracking speed, direction, hard braking, stability and, of course, the inflation of the airbags. Since any accident my family or I have ever been involved in could be explained within the usual parameters of causation, I wondered who cared so deeply about our driving faux pas?

Turns out that in the event of an accident, your insurance company has the right to legally remove the “black box” for analysis from the car that you had, until that point in time, thought belonged totally to you. While there may exist some quasi-legal dodges to enforce rights of ownership, I don't think this Supreme Court would be on the citizen's side should push come to shove.

And then there's the wonderful free apps for your smartphone that are giving numerous organizations enough data about you that they could form a pretty accurate description of your life should the need arise. It turns out that by analyzing as few as 300 “likes” on your Facebook page, your personality is revealed so thoroughly to Facebook data accumulators that they understand your personality better than your spouse.

I wonder if all of this is really necessary.

Last month, while traveling out West, we thought we'd order food and have it delivered to our room because it was already pitch black outside and we weren't familiar with the town. It may have been a small town but of course there was a Domino's Pizza. Since ordering food online didn't sound too cutting edge (although I'd never tried to before), I fired up the laptop, but things quickly got out of hand. First, the Domino's site wanted a zip code to know which “store” (not restaurant) we'd be using. That made sense, but a scramble for the motel stationary turned up nothing, nothing on the room key, but finally a flip though the phone book in the night stand bailed me out. Then I was asked to start my Domino's Profile, which would add another user name, password and email account (I have a few) to my already overflowing file cabinet of secret words and handshakes. I closed my laptop's lid. I mean, I don't even know where the closest Domino's is back home in Brighton, but I need a profile to order a pizza?

Last year I learned that the same computer server that stores Amazon Prime's (and every other bit of Amazon's) transaction information also holds data for the CIA; now what could possibly go wrong there? I'm just thankful that thus far I've led a very boring, uninteresting life. I hope.

None of these facts seems to rile up the group known as Millennials. Most of them accept the tradeoff that by using Google as your search engine, Google Maps as your GPS, a local cell tower pinpointing your location with every phone call made or received, and tracking every video ever watched on YouTube, you have less privacy than any Cold War spy sneaking through the back alleys of Moscow.

There's an Alfred E. Neuman “What, me worry?” vibe to them.

The Millennials were raised with a keyboard on their lap and a mouse in their hand, surfing the web while talking or texting on their phones. All of this digitized inter-connectedness is neither new nor threatening in the least to them.

As Butch asked Sundance, “Who are those guys?”

Hebdo vs. Apple

When discussions about selling French magazine Charlie Hebdo on iTunes fell apart in 2010 due to censorship concerns, publisher Stephane Charbonnier turned his satirical sights on Apple and especially Steve Jobs.

French Printer Held Hostage by Kouachis

After murdering the editors and writers at Charlie Hebdo, the killers sought refuge in a suburban Paris print shop. Ignoring the irony of hiding in a print shop, where content is actually given form for distribution, the brothers did get their wish to die for their cause.

Is There a Book Glut? Does It Matter?

Like unvisited web sites, there are thousands of new titles offered every year that never find an audience. Do all of these titles dilute the market or simply ensure that a sort of “literary evolution” will provide a steady stream of quality writing?

Kindle Unlimited Disappoints Authors

As ebook subscription services gain traction, the exception is Amazon's Kindle Unlimited service which is becoming known for obscure titles. Are ebook subscriptions to blame for falling ebook sales?

Authors United vs the Digerati

A reaction to the Amazon vs Hachette tiff was the formation of Authors United, a consequence decried by the “all digital, all the time” disciples of Jeff Bezos. A former Random House editor considers the current landscape.

Printers Continue to Struggle

Printers continue to struggle with flat sales posting a disappointing final quarter for 2014 that was essentially the same as 2013. Forecasts for 2015 warn that print growth will weakly follow a rising GDP with plants running at about 70% capacity.

Unlimited Digital Magazine Subscriptions Last month we showed how to get 150 digital domestic magazines for $10/month. How about 2,000 local and international monthlies for $9.99?

eBook Sales Stall, Print Posts Gains

The sales of printed books cratered in 2012 and has been steadily, if slowly, rising since then. Ebook sales, however, seem to have plateaued. And students who had used both preferred printed text books 2:1.

B&N Has a Pulse

Barnes & Noble surprised industry watchers with a stronger than expected holiday sales report. While digital content and Nook sales fell, overall sales were up very slightly over the previous year.

Your eBook Reader is Tattling on You

Your ebook reader reports not only on what you read but also on what you don't read, even the very page you quit reading on in Fifty Shades of Gray. Publishers are paying attention to all of this data but are wondering how to act on it. 

 

 Penguin Drop Caps Covers

Giving an artist a seemingly arbitrary constraint can often focus the artist's creativity. Book covers that are designed using the first initial of an author's surname form the basis of a unique and attractive set of 26 books (for sale at Barnes & Noble as single volumes or as Nook editions.((?))).

UK eBook Platform Closing

English mega-retailer Tesco has announced it will be closing its ebook division blinkbox Books. The division was just about to celebrate its first year of operations. Publishers had hailed its creation as an alternative to Amazon's dominance in the market.

Final Thought

 Winston Churchill