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Amazon Lets Readers Shop via Text Message
The company's TextBuyIt service is a relatively quick and easy way to shop using text messaging.
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On Demand Books Signs Agreement with Lightning Source
On Demand Books, owner of the Espresso Book Machine, has signed a deal with Lightning Source that will give Espresso access to content scanned by Lightning.
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Handicapping a B&N Takeover of Borders
It may in part be wishful thinking, but most publishers do not believe Barnes & Noble will move ahead with an acquisition of Borders. Too much overlap among stores and too expensive to integrate the back-office and physical infrastructure, goes the thinking. “B&N doesn't need the name, locations, expertise or systems” was the way one publisher summarized his view of a potent...
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Amazon to Force POD Publishers to Use BookSurge
BookSurge has told print-on-demand publishers that if they want their titles listed on parent company Amazon.com's Web site, their titles must be made available through BookSurge. The move pits BookSurge/Amazon agains the leading pod printer Lightning Source.
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Roaring Brook’s Web Wonder
One of the hottest things on the Internet right now is a one minute 20 second video of someone flipping through a children’s book. Pretty heady stuff in the age of Britney Spears and Twiggy the Water Skiing Squirrel. The bookish star of the clip is ABC3D (Roaring Brook/Neal Porter), a pop-up by French artist Marion Bataille.
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Houghton Mifflin Cleans House at Harcourt San Diego
As part of its integration of Harcourt into the newly formed Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Trade & Reference Publishers division, staffers in the old Harcourt San Diego office were told their fates this week. The majority of staffers at the office--which Houghton said would close this summer--were not offered relocation packages to the east coast.
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Sweet Valley High: Back in Session
In 1983, Bantam published the first of Francine Pascal’s Sweet Valley High novels, starring a pair of twins: sweet, studious Elizabeth and scheming, snobby Jessica. Sales of the 156 novels in the series reached 60 million copies. Now Random House Children’s Books is introducing these teenage twins to a new generation of readers.
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Archipelago Wins Miriam Bass; AAP Indie Meeting Set
The Brooklyn-based not-for-profit literary press, Archipelago Books, has been awarded this year's Miriam Bass prize. The AAP has also announced the speaker line-up for its annual small and independent annual meeting program.
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B&N Launches How-To Site Quamut.com
Barnes & Noble announced today its launch of Quamut.com, a how-to Web site. The site offers free online guides on more than 1,000 topics, and is supported through display ads, Google AdSense ads, and the sale of PDFs and printed charts.
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Used Titles Drive Book Sales at Hastings
Used books helped to drive up same store sales at Hastings Entertainment by 2.1% in the year ended January 31. The electronics segment had the strongest gains, with music sales falling sharply again.
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Bertelsmann/Random House By the Numbers
18.76 billion: Worldwide sales for Bertelsmann, in euros ($24.4 billion), in 2007 19.30 billion: Worldwide sales for Bertelsmann, in euros, in 2006 1.84 billion: Worldwide sales for Random House, in euros ($2.39 billion), in 2007 1.95 billion: Worldwide sales for Random House, in euros, in 2006 173 million: Random House earnings before interest & taxes, in euros ($225 million), in 2007 182 ...
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Publishers Keeping An Eye on Borders
Publishers had a wide range of reactions following last week's dual announcements from Borders Group that it is considering selling the company and had also received $42.5 million in financing from Pershing Capital Management, its largest shareholder, which has also offered to buy the company's international operations for $125 million.
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Amazon Completes Audible Acquisition
Amazon has completed its $300 million purchase of Audible, making the distributor of digital audio and Amazon subsidiary.
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Random Results Off; B’mann May Sell Clubs
Citing a weak dollar and slowing consumer spending sales and earnings fell at Random House in 2007. Random chairman Peter Olson also noted that the publisher suffered from a lack of megaselling hardcovers. The news was far worse at the Direct Group where a bad performance in the U.S. (home to the former Bookspan), resulted in a 4% decline in sales and a 91% drop in earnings. Bertelsmann said it will consider selling the Direct Group.
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Just Books Up for Sale
After six years running the Old Greenwich, Conn.-based Just Books Too, the Lawton family is putting the store up for sale, along with its neighboring coffee shop, Arcadia Coffee Company.
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‘Pigeon’ Fans Want An... Answer
How high can Pigeon fly? Hyperion hopes that the arrival of the latest addition to Mo Willems’s picture book series next month will only add to Pigeon’s mischievous appeal. The new book, which boasts a 250,000-copy first printing, is currently referred to as The Pigeon Wants A...; the full title will not be revealed until the book’s April 1 pub date.
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The Lion, the Witch and the Web
In 2005, the film The Chronicles of Narnia: The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe earned more than $750 million worldwide. HarperCollins sold more than 17 million units of Narnia products during the six-month period leading up to that film’s release. Now, the publisher is launching Read It Before You See It, a digital marketing campaign that aims to bring more readers into the fold in advance of the May release of The Chronicles of Narnia: Prince Caspian.
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Bestselling Chinese Series Makes U.S. Debut
Last August, HarperCollins U.K. acquired the first eight titles in Hongying Yang’s Naughty Ma Xiaotao series (there are 18 in all), which have been renamed Mo’s Mischief; this April the books will be published simultaneously in Britain and the U.S.
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A Rowling Recap
Last week Rowling and Warner Bros. issued a response to a filing by RDR Books, the Michigan publisher that plans to release Harry Potter Lexicon, based on material posted on a Harry Potter fan Web site.
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Q&A with 'Hotlanta' Authors
Children's Bookshelf spoke with Denene Millner and Mitzi Miller, co-authors of
Hotlanta (Scholastic/Point, Apr.), first in a three-book series about two affluent African-American teens, and the mystery they get embroiled in.
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