Booksquare

My mark of a good conference is how I feel when it’s over. It’s a given that I’ll be exhausted (I am an introvert after all), so the test is whether or not I’m inspired to do something. Read, write, create, think. This is how I felt at the end of this year’s Tools of [...]

A recent meme in publishing is that some readers are exhibiting a sense of “entitlement” about buying ebooks. I’d like to humbly offer myself as Exhibit A. It is true: I feel entitled to buy books. I insist upon it, actually*.
Seriously, is it ever a good idea to disparage your customers? To treat them like [...]

No matter where you stand on the various issues surrrounding the future of publishing, one thing is clear: without readers, what we do doesn’t matter very much. We sometimes take the privilege of our bookish lives for granted, forgetting how many people out there would give anything to be able to pick up a book [...]

Yep, it’s time to predict the future! I’ve pulled the BS crystal ball out of storage, buffed it to a shine, and gazed deep and long. Through the glass — which has no mystical ability, as far as I can tell — I saw the future splayed in a haphazard pile: a beautiful cookbook, my [...]

So last week, I attempted to jumpstart a new kind of discussion about managing digital rights, and, happily, many people were more than happy to participate. This week, I’m going to try to summarize and respond to what they said. Here’s a sneak preview: publishers, you’re doing it wrong, but not for reasons you think!
Let’s [...]

Once upon a time, I believed that nobody wanted a single purpose reading device. Why, I wondered, would anyone want something that did only one thing*, albeit very well? It made no sense to me. We had the technology and all that.
(And this despite my lifelong love affair with the classic single purpose reader.)
I was [...]

When I was a wee reader, my grandmother assured me that reading in poor light would destroy my eyes. Actually, heredity was the real culprit, and modern science would save me from the tyranny of eyeglasses*. I admit it: I was one of those kids who had to read, and that meant I had to [...]

A few years ago, I wrote a post lamenting the lack of book people at the South by Southwest Interactive festival. Last year, as we know, a panel put together by a group of publishers missed its target, angering the audience. This year…wow, it’s a bookstravaganza.
I am so pleased to see so many book folk [...]

There is no doubt we live in a time of change. Last week, I wrote that it’s never good for an industry when its customer base changes faster than the business model. It’s even more dangerous when you assume your product is recession-proof, technology-proof, distraction-proof.
I was reminded of this again when I read David Ulin’s [...]

One reason I focus on the world of digital publishing is because it’s the most exciting thing in the book world today. Oh sure, we might, collectively, raise an eyebrow or two at the humongous advances paid to authors like Yann Martel, especially given the current state of industry and the author’s own admission that [...]