Tag Archives: business

Book Links: New French Bookseller Law, 11 Lessons from Jane Eyre, 10 Best Alpha Males in Lit, Drones to Deliver Textbooks, EBook App Features, 11 YA to Make You Cry

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New French Law Bars Online Booksellers to Offer Discounts With Free Shipping | GoodReader
The French parliament has passed a law that makes it illegal for online stores to deliver books for free while also offering a 5 percent discount on the price of the book. The move is being seen as a means of protecting the interests of independent booksellers as much as it is to limit Amazon’s monopoly in the segment. As Christian Kert, the conservative MP who tabled the bill puts it, the bill is aimed at ensuring “that the price of a book sold online is higher than one sold by an independent bookshop.” The government stated they look forward to “restricting predatory behaviour” with the new bill.

11 Lessons That ‘Jane Eyre’ Can Teach Every 21st Century Woman About How To Live Well | HuffPost Books
The novel was very shocking for its time. One reviewer said that the book “might be written by a woman but not by a lady.” People were scandalized that Eyre returned to Rochester. However, the first edition still sold out in six weeks. Every time I encounter a woman who hasn’t read this book, I advise reading it immediately. Women can learn so much from this great Victorian heroine. [T]here’s much to be learned from the way she chooses to live.

10 Alpha Males In Literature | Jill Shalvis (romance author) | HuffPost Books
What qualifies me to make such a list? Because I write alphas, I read alphas, heck I even married an alpha (Hi, Alpha Man!). I believe an alpha has to be lovable as well as strong.

Australian textbook delivery, care of drones | CNET
A textbook rental start-up will deliver its packages to Sydney customers by drone starting next spring. From ordering to delivery, the entire process could take as little as two minutes.

Reading Made Awesome: The Features of Ebook Apps You Should Be Using | LifeHacker
Reading books on tablets or phones is awesome. There, I said it and I’m not taking it back. While the biggest advantage of reading on a mobile device is convenience and a huge portable library, there are a ton of features that make the experience awesome.

11 Young Adult Books Sure to Make You Cry | Mashable
Book-lovers and high schoolers are celebrating Teen Read Week, but even if you’re way past adolescence, you can enjoy a tear-jerking YA novel at any age. Young adult literature sometimes receives a bad rap as a depressing genre, but a hallmark of YA books is actually a hopeful ending. That doesn’t mean some of the more emotional titles won’t leave you in a puddle of your own tears.

National Literacy Trust partners with McDonalds | The Bookseller

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The National Literacy Trust is partnering with McDonald’s to provide “reading tips” to its child diners.

The fast-food chain already offers a “Happy Reader” voucher in every Happy Meal box sold, which allows parents to acquire a children’s book worth around £4.99, for just £1 from high street retailer W H Smith.

Now the National Literacy Trust has teamed up to advise on suitable recommendations for Happy Meal book promotions and to review and advise on the design and content of all text-based elements of the McDonald’s Happy Meal, including the Happy Meal box and activity sheets. The charity will also share industry research and insight to help develop the Happy Readers programme “in a way that will add most value for children, parents and families”.

Read: National Literacy Trust partners with McDonalds | The Bookseller.

Related: McDonalds to stuff kids books into Happy Meals next month | USA Today 

Kobo and WH Smith overreact to the porn titles in their catalogs | Dear Author

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RELATED: WH Smith takes website offline after porn e-book scandal | BBC News

Here’s another perspective of the situation from Dear Author.

Full Article

Yesterday, Kobo pulled all the content from the distributor Draft 2 Digital in response to the complaints retailers were receiving about the incest and beastiality books being self published. Authors refer to this content as Psuedo Incest because it is really about step brothers and step fathers, not blood relatives, but because Daddy PI was showing up in the children’s literature section, WH Smith went to the drastic step of shutting down its website (which is likely costing them thousands, if not hundreds of thousands of dollars a day) and Kobo pulled all the D2D content. Much of the D2D content is not “porn” but YA, sweet romance, and the like.

Part of the problem is that authors who are writing PI stuff will relabel their content in order to get around the filters. I think the extreme reaction is due to a few authors trying to mess with the system and reducing the efficacy of filters. For instance, authors would change the title of their book to get through the filter but the cover would have a different title – one that is disallowed. Authors would use the names of famous authors in their tags or descriptions so that the books would show up when someone was searching for other things. I can’t tell you how irksome it was that one author’s porn books kept showing up when I was trying to compile a new release list for “Forever Romance.”

Other authors were putting up excerpts in the description area that were full on sex scenes.

At Kobo, their search function is even worse.  Search a middle grade author name and a bunch of porn titles show up because Kobo can’t get its search feature to work correctly.

What is clear is that Direct 2 Digital uses no filters unlike Smashwords. None of the Smashwords titles were taken down but the ones from D2D were, likely because D2D had no way of filtering out the questionable content.

There’s been a great deal of panic and accusations flying but the actions appear to be taken primarily by Kobo and WH Smith. For now, it appears the following is true:

  • Kobo is removing self published content in addition to the Draft 2 Digital stuff. If a book was part of an indie consortium that Kobo doesn’t like, then the whole consortium’s books were removed. No update as to when this will be resolved.
  • No content has been removed from any reader’s Kindle. Lots of readers seem to be in a tizzy about this but I have seen zero evidence of this. – Indie authors have been whispering this into indie bloggers’ ears and it was all over facebook last night. Removing content from the store (or in Amazon’s case, putting the content into draft status) is not the same thing as taking stuff away from your Kindle account. Amazon won’t even remove plagiarized crap from your Kindle account. Seriously I had to restrain myself from using allcaps all over the Internet yesterday and it wasn’t easy.
  • Amazon is not going to war against self published erotica. Given that the dino porn is still up as is tons of other porn, the evidence is strongly against any war against indies and/or erotica. What they don’t want is a bunch of in your face incest, rape and child porn stuff showing up in regular searches but when authors keep trying to futz with the filter, the banhammer comes down hard and broad. They appear to be putting any erotica author’s work into draft if it contains “sister, brother, child, babysitter, daddy, mother” and the like.  The author will then have to go back to Amazon and republish the work. Some authors reported that working within hours while others were still being vetted.
  • Amazon is going through and putting authors’ titles to “draft” status which means that the content isn’t deleted, but rather it can’t be purchased until Amazon determines that the content doesn’t violate its anti porn clause (which it selectively enforces).
  • Authors having their content removed is a bigger deal than readers having their content removed. Or do Kobo and other retailers not have the right to enforce their content policies just like Goodreads? Or is somehow constraining commercial speech and the sale of porn more concerning than critical speech?

Anyway, I digress. Enough people complained and media sat up and now the retailers are doing something. Does this mean that the content is never coming back? Doubtful. Right now it means that Amazon and Kobo are vetting content that they pulled which is likely going to take a really long time.

via Tuesday News: Kobo and WH Smith overreact to the porn titles in their catalogs | Dear Author

 

How to Get Your Resume Past the System and Into Human Hands | Mashable

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Landing an interview for a position in a giant organization can feel impossible if you don’t have any personal connections. People often blame the sheer volume of resumes that are submitted — HR simply can’t review them all with enough detail to see what a perfect candidate you are.

And this is partially true — one study suggests that recruiters spend only six seconds looking at each resume. However, many resumes are trashed before they’re even seen by human eyes. How is that possible?

Here’s how: Many large organizations rely on applicant tracking systems (ATS) to help pre-filter resumes. The systems work by scanning resumes for contextual keywords and key phrases, mathematically scoring them for relevance, and sending only the most qualified ones through for human review. [C]heck out these tips for writing a resume that an ATS will approve — and a hiring manager will love.

The article suggests 4 tips.

Read: How to Get Your Resume Past the System and Into Human Hands | Mashable

McDonalds to stuff kids books into Happy Meals next month | USA Today

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McDonalds, the kingpin of fast food and lightning rod for consumer activist groups, plans to distribute more than 20 million paperback books inside its Happy Meals in the U.S. during the two-week period between Nov. 1 and 14. 

Snips:

[T]he four books are based on McDonald’s own animated animals, including a goat, ant, dodo bird and, yes, a dinosaur…The books, whose titles include The Goat Who Ate Everything and Doddi the Dodo Goes to Orlando, will focus on nutrition, imagination and active play.

McComb says McDonald’s will partner with literacy non-profit Reading Is Fundamental to give out an additional 100,000 books. The Nov. 1 roll-out is a tie-in with National Family Literacy Day, she says. Each book is 24-28 pages. McDonald’s declined to give a dollar value for each book.

Read: McDonalds to stuff kids books into Happy Meals next month | USA Today.

5 Skills Every Workplace Leader Needs [Infographic] | DashBurst

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Read the full story: 5 Skills Every Workplace Leader Needs [Infographic] | DashBurst

  1. Constantly Evaluating the Business Environment
  2. Managing Projects Efficiently
  3. Cultivating Strategic Thinking and Innovation
  4. Managing Change and Uncertainty
  5. Shaping Your Organization’s Future

5 Skills Leaders Need

The Abomination of Ebooks: They Price People Out of Reading | Wired Opinion | Wired.com

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This is not one of those rants about missing the texture, touch, colors, whatever of paper contrasted with the sterility of reading on a tablet. No, the real abomination of ebooks is often overlooked: Some are so ingrained in the product itself that they are hiding in plain sight, while others are well concealed beneath layers of commerce and government.

The real problem with ebooks is that they’re more “e” than book, so an entirely different set of rules govern what someone — from an individual to a library — can and can’t do with them compared to physical books, especially when it comes to pricing.

The collusion of large ebook distributors in pricing has been a public issue for a while, but we need to talk more about how they are priced differently to consumers and to libraries. That’s how ebooks contribute to the ever-growing divide between the literary haves and have-nots.

Read the full story: The Abomination of Ebooks: They Price People Out of Reading | Wired Opinion | Wired.com.

These TechBikers Just Built 16 Libraries After Cycling From Paris To London | TechCrunch

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Last year a bunch of European tech startup founders got on their bikes and raised money for charity. This weekend just gone the TechBikers – 70 founders/techies – once again achieved their 200 mile, 3 day cycle ride from Paris to London in style. 

As a result of last year’s ride, TechBikers built a school and two libraries in Nepal. This year they’ve so far raised $75,000, enough money to build sixteen libraries or schools in India, Africa and Asia.

Read: These TechBikers Just Built 16 Libraries After Cycling From Paris To London | TechCrunch.

Design And Print Your Own Moleskines With Paper’s New “Book” | Co.Design

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Paper is an amazing iPad app–and one of our Innovation By Design nominees–because its team at FiftyThree cracked the code of making creation a simple, beautiful experience on tablets. There’s just one problem: Paper isn’t actually paper; it’s a screen.

Today, FiftyThree and Moleskine are revealing a solution called Book. For $40, you will be able to turn your Paper sketches into a custom Moleskine print. The 15-page, accordion-style, handmade “Book” marks the first time that the iconic Moleskine has ever allowed cover customization. It’s also a potential peek into the future strategy of FiftyThree, a company that hasn’t been shy about their plan to expand their purview into a whole suite of creative productivity apps.

Read: Design And Print Your Own Moleskines With Paper’s New “Book” | Co.Design | business + design.

HarperCollins partners with Scribd for ebook subscription service | Quill & Quire

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HarperCollins has partnered with document-sharing website Scribd on a new ebook subscription service.

Dubbed “Netflix for ebooks,” subscribers pay $8.99 a month for the ability to check out an unlimited number of ebooks – up to 10 titles at time – from the Scribd catalogue, which includes backlists from HarperCollins and several small U.S. presses. The service allows readers to switch between browsers, Android, and Apple devices without losing their place.

HarperCollins CEO Brian Murray told the Associated Press that the partnership will provide the publisher with valuable data about Scribd readers. “This is going to help us make even better publishing and marketing decisions for our authors,” he says.

The international service is now available in Canada, although not all titles are accessible for download.

HarperCollins partners with Scribd for ebook subscription service | Quill & Quire