Touchstone Bets on Media Predict

by Rachel Deahl, PW Daily -- Publishers Weekly, 5/21/2007

Touchstone Books is trying its hand at a more populist approach to publishing. The Simon & Schuster imprint has teamed with Media Predict (link to www.mediapredict.com), a new Web site that lets users evaluate not-yet-distributed entertainment—everything from unaired TV pilots to book proposals—and invest in them with fake money. The site functions like an imaginary stock market, allowing users to invest fantasy money in those projects they think have the most potential.

Media Predict is teaming with Touchstone for Project Publish. Touchstone—which is the first media division to team with Media Predict—will evaluate the 50 most popular proposals on the site, ultimately signing one for publication. To be eligible, proposals, which may be submitted by both agents and unrepresented writers, must be posted between May and September; site members will "invest" in their favorites, and Touchstone editors will select five of the top scoring projects as finalists. The finalists will then be reposted on the site, where users can trade in them again, with the winning proposal signed announced on October 9.

Touchstone, which has recently teamed on a similar project with Gather.com—the imprint has agreed to publish the most popular manuscripts submitted to the online community (link to: http://www.publishersweekly.com/article/CA6430642.html?q=touchstone)—touted Media Predict as a potentially valuable tool in the manuscript evaluation process. According to Mark Gompertz, Touchstone's executive editor and publisher, the site offers "the ultimate pre-publication, market-based focus group."