Amazon Now Sells More E-Books Than Print Books

Wow!  This happened a lot faster than I thought it would just a couple of short years ago.

I was surfing the Internet and saw this article from our friends at Computerworld.

Amazon says it sells 105 Kindle based e-books (not counting the free e-books, so these are actual purchases) for every 100 print books.  Did I say this already?  Wow!

From that article:

“Amazon CEO Jeff Bezos said the e-book threshold arrived sooner than expected. “Customers are now choosing Kindle books more often than print books,” he said. “We had high hopes that this would happen eventually, but we never imagined it would happen this quickly.” Amazon has sold print books for 15 years and Kindle books for less than four.”

Glad I got my Nook.  In the Nook of time….haha.

Criminal Element

Got this email today announcing the opening of a new web site dedicated to crime and mystery.  CriminalElement.com   Pretty cool.

Here is the complete press release.  Gee I wonder if they like my original horror stories?

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

Contact: Sarah Melnyk

646-307-5662

sarah.melnyk@stmartins.com

MACMILLAN TO LAUNCH PUBLISHER-NEUTRAL CRIME AND MYSTERY COMMUNITY WEBSITE:

CRIMINAL ELEMENT

(CriminalElement.com)

NEW YORK, NY, 4/26/2011–Macmillan announces the launch of a new crime and mystery-focused community website with a focus on sharing and enriching the experience of crime story fandom. Liz Edelstein, Senior Manager and editor at Macmillan Community Network, made the announcement, and said that the site will highlight different areas of the genre, from noir to cozies and everything in between.

The site will feature pre-release excerpts, original short stories from various authors in the space, topical blog posts, and will eventually be offering downloads and podcasts.  It’s a place for fans of the genre to come together in one exciting online space.  At launch there will be excerpts, original fiction and articles by authors Joseph Finder, Steve Hamilton, Rosemary Harris, Charles Ardai, Luis Alberto Urrea and more.

Much like its successful sister sites, science fiction community Tor.com and romance community HeroesandHeartbreakers.com, CriminalElement.com is “publisher neutral,” meaning that it will include author participation from all publishers and other content creators, and is not exclusive to Macmillan authors.

“This is not a typical review or promotions site,” says Edelstein.  “We think of CriminalElement.com as a community for fans, by fans, and the focus is on editorial content rather than on marketing.”

CriminalElement.com will have a social media presence on both Facebook and Twitter as well; visitwww.facebook.com/crimehq and www.twitter.com/crimehq respectively.

With CriminalElement.com, Macmillan is leading the charge in creating a themed community for authors and fans to interact and share their love of crime fiction and nonfiction.

Original short story submissions and pre-release excerpts from authors at any publishing house or other interested parties are truly welcome. Those interested should contact Liz Edelstein atsubmissions@criminalelement.com

About Liz Edelstein, Senior Manager and editor, CriminalElement.com

Working in the intersection of the digital publishing revolution, Edelstein started her career in technology as a product manager at Netscape/AOL and later moved into online book marketing. Prior to taking on this latest role, Edelstein was the Digital Content and Marketing Manager at Macmillan Audio.  Edelstein is also an award-winning author, having published thirteen romance novels under the pseudonym Liz Maverick. Edelstein and her books have been featured in USA Today, Cosmopolitan, San Francisco Magazine, The Chicago Sun-Times, The Toronto Star, and more.

For more information on CriminalElement.com, please contact Liz Edelstein or Sarah Melnyk.

Liz Edelstein

Macmillan Community Network

(646) 307-5090

Liz.Edelstein@macmillan.com

Sarah Melnyk

Minotaur Books

(646) 307-5662

sarah.melnyk@stmartins.com

The eBook Bookstore

I ran across this article on CNN this morning.

Very interesting and very scary for those of us who LOVE books, but, the changes in how bookstores evolve in the next few years will be interesting to watch.

To summarize the article:  Borders is going under chapter 11, and Barnes & Noble stock is down almost 80% since 2006.  The swiftness of the eBook phenomena took Borders and Barnes & Noble (and ME!) by surprise.  Of the two, B&N is doing the best job moving to the eBook world, but, the article says it may not be fast enuf.  It says that B&N will be closing stores (many of them) and / or downsizing and / or leasing out space (see my future below) in the once sprawling book aisles.  It sees Nook boutiques…and a whole new look for what once were the mighty “bookstore”.

The eBook trend has the publishing industry facing tough times ahead as well.  See this discussion between Authors Barry Eisler and Joe Konrath.

“These are interesting times, Harry”

My Future B&N

I can imagine the new Barnes & Noble housing a coworking location within it’s walls (hell, we already have B&N tables at AltamontCowork, see the above pic), with video conferencing stations for those who need to keep in visual contact with their company or attend meetings remotely.  Barnes & Noble coworking….how cool would that be?

There could be a section of the once large store where parents can take their kids while they cowork.  B&N Day Care.

The Cafe will stay, and a large section of Nook ebook readers and accessories could be located somewhere close.  In fact, a whole small community can evolve in a single empty B&N store; from fast food, to a small grocery, to whatever….this new community could be billed as a “green working environment”.

#telecommuting = #coworking = #Barnes&Noble

Google ebookstore

If you have an eReader that can read Adobe’s ebook format (Nook, Sony Reader and some others….not Kindle) you can download and read books from the new Google ebookstore.

Since it was just announced today, I have not had time to play with it on my Nook, but, over the next few weeks, I will give it a try even though I will stay with Barnes & Noble for my book purchases.

They have a Thrillers section…very cool.

 

The End of Publishing?

A friend posted this on Facebook….pretty cool, but, you need to stay put all the way through it.

Book Trailers

***** Watch these cool (Award Winning!) book trailers *****

3/18/13

“A reader lives a thousand lives before he dies….The man who never reads lives only one.”.  George R.R. Martin, “Dance with Dragons”.

Color Nook

 

Just when I started to love my Nook….along comes a new suitor for my affections.

I heard from my wife via text and then friend 3Pigs (yeah…ok that is an alias) that the Nook was now out in color.  Crap….I have been so distracted with ForCarol.com (and the complete loss of THIS blog yesterday….notice the new look and all the broken links…arrrghh) that I completely missed this.

Our good friends at PC Mag.com have the full story, but, apparently the color Nook is awesome.

Sporting a 7 inch screen with a resolution of 1024 x 600 with 16 million colors and 8 Gig of RAM (do they still call it RAM?) and a slot for a micro-sd memory chip.   It is running Android 2.1 and has integrated WiFi.  Good enuf for me!

Big question?  Is it slow as molasses like my Nook or did they speed it up?

PCMag.com says it has a kids section where the color Nook can read to a kid…pretty cool, but, I need to see it.

It has Facebook and Twitter access….geeezz…..when I read I want to get AWAY from that!  Arrrghhh…..

Oh well….I’ll see if I can play with it at Tracy’s Barnes & Noble this Friday….and give a first hand account of what I think below.  Until then…go read the PCMag.com article…very cool.