MetaFilter posts tagged with publishing

Frankfurter Buchmesse

ocherdraco — Fri, 30 Oct 2009 10:18:25 -0800

Perhaps you have seen the recent video of flies zooming around a "German trade show" like little banner planes? That "German Trade Show" was the Frankfurt Book Fair (Frankfurter Buchmesse)—the most important event in the book publishing world. It's international; all the major US publishers go, as do many agents, to meet their foreign counterparts and to buy and sell projects amid publishing's eternal and ever-present air of fatalism. This year's fair had some interesting subplots, the most visible of which was the complicated dance the organizers did with this year's guest of honor, China, as accusations of censorship (on the part of China) and of brown-nosing (on the part of the fair's organizers) flew. The Frankfurt Book Fair has been held, on and off, since 1454. The Millions' review of A History of the Frankfurt Book Fair gives a nice capsule overview of the Fair's history since its inaugural fair, which Gutenberg himself may or may not have attended:

Then there was a long, protracted fall. Between 1680 and 1690, nearly every publishing house in Frankfurt collapsed due to the indebtedness of publishers. As a result of this there was an anti-Semitic backlash, Jewish financiers becoming the scapegoats for the failure of the publishing houses, and regulations were imposed forbidding trading to Jews. In fact, it was the wars instigated by Louis XIV, and repercussions of the War of the Spanish Succession that crippled the economy. As well, the Reformation had moved the intellectual hub north, and the center of trade was shifting east, giving Leipzig an edge over Frankfurt. Bookshops in Frankfurt turned into bars. By the mid-1800s, even Leipzig was in decline. Book fairs – as they were envisioned then – had had their day, as the book trade was no longer dependent on fairs. The modern era of the Frankfurt Book Fair, after a few false starts, began in the late 1940s. The 1950 fair was a major success. It was both a cultural exchange and a trade show emphasizing merchandising and marketing. A literary peace prize had also been established – Albert Schweitzer won it that year – giving the fair an added PR boost. There was no shortage of intrigue in the post-war book fair. The Cold War and the building of the Berlin Wall led to the infiltration of West Germany (and the Frankfurt Book Fair) by East German spies! Beginning in 1967 and continuing into the 70s, undercover agents (using pseudonyms) from East German publishing houses were covertly checking out the activity at the fair, seeing which of their authors had books there.

N.B.: I am a book editor. It's possible (but unlikely) that I know someone mentioned somewhere in the things I've linked to.

An ingenious device for avoiding thought...

smoke — Thu, 13 Aug 2009 05:56:20 -0800

The brain's plasticity has some neuroscientists worried about what the internet will do to reading - and to humanity. But teenagers - the very demographic you would expect to suffer most from the google-induced inability to focus and critique - are in fact reading more than ever. Or are they? Young adult fiction might be selling, but who's doing the reading?

It is available through churches and at Wal-Marts....

squalor — Fri, 19 Jun 2009 10:27:02 -0800

“They are brands that may not be considered cool by the often elitist and self-absorbed standards of New York media,” she said. She had taken a car from Manhattan that morning, and wore a pink wool shirt-dress, patent leather Manolo Blahnik heels, and diamond hoop earrings.

Reader's Digest jumps the shark. (NYT)

These findings are especially taters in the context of the what cancer taters further future investigation into this field.

NikitaNikita — Fri, 12 Jun 2009 14:20:24 -0800

Research journal accepts a computer-generated nonsense paper, and leads the editor-in-chief to resign his post. The authors write about their hijinks on their blog The Scholarly Kitchen. Philip Davis, a Cornell Ph.D. graduate student in scientific communications "coauthored" the paper with Kent Anderson, executive director of international business and product development at the New England Journal of Medicine, and the help of the online auto-paper generator SCIgen. This isn't the first time Davis et al have attempted to submit this work to the publisher, Bentham Publishers, before. Bentham is also known for indiscriminately inviting academic researchers to join their editorial board. Other fun in fake academic publishing: Merck's look-a-like journal, and Previously on Metafilter.

We don't need another Neo

yeloson — Wed, 13 May 2009 11:06:11 -0800

There's been more and more rumblings lately about the inclusiveness (or lack thereof) of diversity in the circles of sci-fi and fantasy. Pam Nole's classic Shame essay hits a lot of points and while the Carl Brandon Society has been fighting the good fight for some time, more and more people are gathering their own projects, such as Transcriptase or Verb Noire to create spaces and publishing arenas less biased. Are these even necessary? It seems the fans think so.

A Strange Erotic Journey from Milan to Minsk

Horace Rumpole — Wed, 22 Apr 2009 05:44:26 -0800

In September 1969, Simon & Schuster was preparing to publish Irving Wallace's The Seven Minutes, a novel about the obscenity trial of a fictitious book of the same name by the fictitious author J.J. Jadway. Maurice Girodias, head of the erotica and avant garde literature publishing house the Olympia Press had a clever idea: what if I publish Jadway's book? Not surprisingly, he didn't get away with it, but did re-release it under the (barely) new title The 7 Erotic Minutes (full text of the book, NSFW). Russ Meyer directed a movie based on Wallace's novel, but the film was a flop.

Building a blog you can be proud of

Brandon Blatcher — Fri, 27 Mar 2009 09:28:00 -0800

John Gruber of Daring Fireball:

"My friend Merlin Mann and I had a session at SXSW Interactive about two weeks ago. It certainly wasn’t a panel, and it wasn’t really a presentation. It was more like an hour-long duet rant, the main goal of which was to inspire anyone who wants to publish or write on the web to pursue their obsessions in a serious way. We got the audio recording of the session from SXSW a few days ago, recorded short intro and outro segments, and Merlin spliced it together and has published it on his 43 Folders podcast. I encourage you to go ahead and listen to it."

light it on fire?

Pants! — Mon, 09 Mar 2009 10:48:28 -0800

How will the Kindle change the publishing business?

JPG magazine folds

diddlegnome — Fri, 02 Jan 2009 03:00:04 -0800

JPG magazine is going out of business. An experiment in crowdsourcing, and the home of some excellent photos, the magazine and Web site are finished as of Monday, Jan. 5. As a subscriber, I enjoyed the magazine. It was always a treat when it arrived in the mailbox; seeing the photos in print was more satisfying than viewing the online versions. JPG never published any of my photos, and while I was always a little surprised to get that "Thanks, but no thanks" e-mail, whenever I saw the finished product, I thought, "Well, *now* I understand." The magazine was founded by Derek Powazek and Heather Champ, and when the company changed direction and they left/were forced out, Derek's blog post about the situation started (or at least publicized) a dustup that prompted an emotional thread on MeFi. The other side (1, 2) was less well received than Derek's version. Some people think the controversy may have marked the beginning of the end for JPG. Anyway, it looks as though the site will be up for just a few more days. If you enjoy photography and have some time this weekend, go take a look.

'Where Forgotton Books are Remembered'

anastasiav — Fri, 05 Dec 2008 10:13:26 -0800

The Neglected Books Page

Would you like to buy an fuzzy multi-instanton knot?

escabeche — Wed, 12 Nov 2008 07:56:25 -0800

"...the best place to hide bulls**t is in a refereed journal that’s not open-access!" The math-physics blog n-category cafe digs into the curious case of M.S. El Naschie. El Naschie is editor-in-chief of the journal Chaos, Solitons, and Fractals, published by the well-respected scientific publisher Elsevier and sold to academic libraries for US$4,520 a year. The problem? El Naschie has published 322 of his own papers in the journal -- papers that John Baez (of "This Week's Finds in Mathematical Physics" and "The Crackpot Index") describes as "vague, dreamlike imagery," "undisciplined numerology larded with impressive buzzwords," and "total baloney." Is El Naschie a reverse Sokal? Or a Markov process for producing random publishable papers? One thing's for sure -- he knows how to cure cancer.

The Henry Ford of Literature

amyms — Thu, 04 Sep 2008 02:00:02 -0800

How One Nearly Forgotten 1920s Publisher's “Little Blue Books” Created An Inexpensive Mail-Order Information Superhighway That Paved The Way For The Sexual Revolution, Influenced The Feminist And Civil Rights Movements, And Foreshadowed The Age Of Information. When Emanuel Haldeman-Julius drowned in his backyard swimming pool, on July 31, 1951, he was popularly regarded as a has-been... Denounced as a communist in national newspapers and investigated by J. Edgar Hoover’s FBI, he had recently lost a federal tax evasion lawsuit and was facing time in jail. Amid the cold war atmosphere of the time, schoolchildren whispered that Haldeman-Julius had actually been assassinated for being a Soviet spy; adults speculated that his death was a suicide... It was an odd ending for a man who, in just over thirty years, had become one of the most prolific publishers in U.S. history, putting an estimated 300 million copies of inexpensive “Little Blue Books” into the hands of working-class and middle-class Americans. Selling for as little as five cents and small enough to fit in a trouser pocket, these books were meant to bring culture and self-education to working people, and covered topics ranging from classic literature to home-finance to sexually pleasuring one’s spouse.

The Walking Dead

Artw — Sun, 03 Aug 2008 17:20:59 -0800

Warren Ellis on the grim future of science fiction magazines. Some of the previous posts he mentions, and response to one from Cory Doctorow (unsuprising short summary: Blogs!). Jason Stoddard on 5 small things and 5 big things Science Fiction can do to improve its image.

A peek behind Philip M. Parker's curtain

jbickers — Mon, 14 Apr 2008 11:09:59 -0800

Remember Philip M. Parker, the much-reviled "author" whose system churns out ultra-long-tail books on ultra-niche topics? Well, here's video of his software, in action. (Via)

Shepard Fairey Meets George Orwell

jonson — Sun, 13 Apr 2008 18:09:25 -0800

Shepard Fairey's cover art for Penguin releases of 1984 & Animal Farm.

The Standard Oil of Books

Toekneesan — Thu, 03 Apr 2008 13:59:11 -0800

Amazon.com dropped a bombshell on the publishing industry with the announcement on Friday that they will no longer allow print on demand books printed by vendors other than Amazon, to be sold directly by Amazon. In other words, use our print services or lose your listing on our site. This decision effects over half a million books listed on their site and could be a defining moment for both publishing and the future of online retailing. The company with the most at stake is Lightning Source, the largest print on demand company in the world. If Amazon makes good on its threat, Lightning Source's 4,300 client publishers and their almost half a million titles on Amazon's site will go from "ships in 24 hours" to unavailable unless those publishers switch to using Amazon's company, BookSurge, as their printer. Hubris or exceptionally bold gamble? There is nothing on Amazon's site about the move. Meanwhile, On Demand, the company developing the Espresso Book Machine (previously), announced today that they have finalized an agreement with Lightning Source that would allow publishers currently using Lightning Source to license that content to On Demand so those books could be printed at Espresso sites. If the EBM catches on and Amazon's catalog is compromised, could brick and mortar bookstores and libraries find themselves with an unexpected windfall?

The Wakefield twins are back... and thinner?

ThePinkSuperhero — Thu, 27 Mar 2008 20:43:33 -0800

If you're a girl and you grew up in the 80's, chances are you read Sweet Valley High books. Guess what? They're being re-released. Don't worry, they're being updated to reflect the times- Jessica and Liz will be a size 4 now, and Liz's gossip column will be a gossip blog instead. Those wishing to relive the glory days can read reviews of the old series at The Dairi Burger, a blog devoted to all things Sweet Valley. I was glad to see they got around to reviewing several of my favorites, including #32, where Jessica dyes her hair black in an attempt to look less all-American, and #3, the one where Bruce touches Jessica's boobs during their ultra hot makeout scene in the woods.

Elegant Pelicans

dobbs — Thu, 31 Jan 2008 18:56:15 -0800

The Pelican Project - six decades of Pelican book covers.

Publishing Industry Trends to Watch in 2008

stbalbach — Wed, 09 Jan 2008 06:00:05 -0800

15 Publishing Industry Trends to Watch in 2008

Simon Vostre

thomas j wise — Thu, 03 Jan 2008 16:59:27 -0800

The late-fifteenth/early-sixteenth century French publisher Simon Vostre was renowned for his Books of Hours. Adoration of the Magi and Dives and Lazarus (first two images) (Bridgeman Art Library) Annunciation to the Shepherds (Lambeth Palace Library) Book of Hours (Bryn Mawr) Book of Hours (Einar Hansen Library) Book of Hours (Wake Forest) Book of Hours (Grolier Club) Book of Hours (scroll down) (Charlie Jensen) Book of Hours (University of Manitoba) Book of Hours (BYU Idaho) Book of Hours (Dance of Death) (Medieval Macabre) Book of Hours for the Use of Rome (scroll down) (British Library) Delphic Sibyl (ArtBase) Flight into Egypt and Adoration of the Trinity (scroll down) (Bridgeman Art Library) Hore Marie virginis scd[u]m vsum Saru[m]... (Bryn Mawr) Les lunettes des Princes Nativity (Princeton) Planetary Man (Morgan Library) Vostre's printer's device The device in color

What act / That roars so loud, and thunders in the index?

scody — Thu, 20 Dec 2007 15:11:57 -0800

This one's for all the editors out there! Remember when index cards were actually used to create... indexes?

Boy Howdy, what a mess

Scram — Sun, 02 Dec 2007 08:12:05 -0800

You'd think news of a Creem Magazine retrospective book would be greeted with cries of glee. You'd be wrong. Occasional staff shutterbug Bob Matheu licensed rights to use the name of the beloved, iconoclastic Detroit rock zine years after it ceased to be relevant, but despite occasional "Creem is back" announcements, only produced a website. But now a Creem book is on the stands, and surviving contributors like Dave Marsh, Sue Whitall, Jaan Uhelszki and publisher's widow Connie Kramer are none too pleased with the contents. Even less happy, the guys who invested most of the money needed to re-secure the rights. But a dust up at a book signing? Lester would approve. More discussion here.

Sorting it all out

Toekneesan — Thu, 01 Nov 2007 07:46:09 -0800

Future Reading. Anthony Grafton explores what we can learn about the future of the text from the history of libraries, publishers, and the sorting of books. See also, A Discussion With Anthony Grafton, The Nutty Professors, and Grafton's lecture on Faustus

Pencils down, please

kurumi — Wed, 31 Oct 2007 15:57:45 -0800

National Novel Writing Month (seen before) starts Nov. 1. The goal: complete a 175-page (50,000-word) novel by midnight, Nov. 30. If you'd like to start, or are otherwise working on a novel, Sean Lindsay and others would like you to please stop. Looking back, the author of "101 Reasons to Stop Writing" sums up his blog's first year: "there are almost as many reasons to stop writing as there are bad writers who need to. When I began I had no idea if I could come up with one hundred and one reasons to stop writing, but now I wonder if I can restrict myself."

New SyHersh video intvu

hortense — Wed, 10 Oct 2007 19:41:57 -0800

New Yorker Festival Interveiw with Seymour M. Hersh found here