Cupertino Super Bowl Shaping Up: Amazon Hopes to Sack Apple with Touchscreen Acquisition

The New York Times's Nick Bilton and Brad Stone report the acquisition by Amazon of Touchco, a tiny New York startup that makes touchscreens boasting features superior to and cheaper than rivals including Apple's iPad.

"Unlike those screens,"the Times reporters say, Touchco screens can "detect an unlimited number of simultaneous touch points." They add that "Touchco’s technology uses resistors that are sensitive to different levels of pressure. It has said its screens can distinguish between the touch of a finger and the pressure of a pen or similar pointing device."

Perhaps the most interesting aspect is full color, vital if you're going to go head to head with Apple. They cite a financial expert as saying that “If touch screens were added to the Kindle or other Amazon devices, it would bring them up to date with the plethora of other screens consumers are becoming used to.”

Amazon will shift development from New York to its labs in Cupertino, California. Hmm. Where have we heard Cupertino before?

Details of the Touchco acquisition here.

RC

Every Blogger owes a debt of gratitude to newspapers and magazines. This posting relies on original research and reporting performed by the New York Times.

New Yorker: Twitter Replaces Rubber Band Balls and Paper Clip Chains as Procrastinator's Best Friend

George Packer writes an occasional blog on the New Yorker's website called "Interesting Times," as in the Chinese curse "May you live in interesting times." In a February 7 2009 posting called Stop the World he rises up in rebellion against Twitter and other social networking tools that tempt him away from his privacy, tranquility and sanity.

"Every time I hear about Twitter I want to yell Stop," he laments. "The notion of sending and getting brief updates to and from dozens or thousands of people every few minutes is an image from information hell." Worst of all is its seductive - no, corrosive - drain on our time. He cites David Carr, the New York Times's media critic: “There is always something more interesting on Twitter than whatever you happen to be working on.”

"This last is what really worries me." comments Packer. "Who doesn’t want to be taken out of the boredom or sameness or pain of the present at any given moment? That’s what drugs are for, and that’s why people become addicted to them."

"Twitter," Packer concludes, "is crack for media addicts. It scares me, not because I’m morally superior to it, but because I don’t think I could handle it. I’m afraid I’d end up letting my son go hungry."

Authors take note. Finish your book and tweet about it. Then turn service off and start a new manuscript.

How did I learn about Packer's article? Why, Twitter, of course.

Richard Curtis

Panic in Blogger Park! Google Pulls Plug on FTP Feed

Last week many bloggers received an email notice from Google that triggered an OMG moment, except that the "G" stood for Google. The firm announced the imminent shut-down of support for those who use Google's FTP site to post their blogs.

Though less than 1% of active blogs are published on FTP, the medium "remains a significant drain on our ability to improve Blogger," writes Rick Klau, the company's Blogger Product Manager. Thus Google will turn the lights out on FTP on March 26 2010. You can read the full text of his announcement here.

"FTP", which stands for "File Transfer Protocol," is a common and convenient method for transferring or exchanging files between computers over the Internet. Most blogger platforms like Blogspot, WordPress and Drupal do not rely on FTP. Those that use Google's FTP may not realize the huge impact on Google's server. Every time you upload a new post via FTP, Google's server republishes and re-synchs every previous single file, image, archive page, and link. If you've been blogging for years, the hit on the FTP is mammoth. Savvy bloggers have been wondering when Google would finally pull the plug. "It was too good to be true," one told me.

Those bloggers that do depend on Google FTP are going to have to scramble to migrate their blogs to another host. Google has offered all sorts of support to make the transition as easy as possible. First, they'll issue more email information in coming weeks, and have created a dedicated blog which you may visit here. In addition, they tell us that...

• We are building a migration tool that will walk users through a migration from their current URL to a Blogger-managed URL (either a Custom Domain or a Blogspot URL) that will be available to all users the week of February 22. This tool will handle redirecting traffic from the old URL to the new URL, and will handle the vast majority of situations.
• Blogger team members will also be available to answer questions on the forum, comments on the blog, and in a few scheduled conference calls once the tool is released

Klau expressed his regrets, acknowledging that his company's decision "will frustrate some users."

Frustrate? How about opening their veins in a tub of warm water! If you're working your blog through Google's FTP feed we strongly suggest you put your backside in overdrive and find an alternative.

Richard Curtis

Rex Miller's Profane Men: A Nasty Book about an Even Nastier War

Profane Men by Rex Miller

Profane Men brings the dark and searing energy of such Miller horror classics as Slob and Chaingang to a story set in Vietnam during the late 1960’s. The novel is clearly informed by Miller's personal experience. In fact, it's filled with autobiographical touches (the central narrator character has a developing career in broadcast radio, among other things).

A rootless young man drifting through life and facing the likelihood of being drafted decides to choose his own destiny, seeking a way to avoid becoming cannon fodder. Unfortunately, he finds himself thrust into some of the worst corners of Vietnam, working with a team of assassins tracking a pirate radio broadcaster who seems to be supplying intelligence to the Viet Cong. And then things get complicated…

Other books by Rex Miller

Guild Offers Buy-Button Tracker

Though Amazon has begun restoring buy buttons to Macmillan books, gun-shy authors may want to take advantage of a website developed by Authors Guild to help them determine if the buttons get turned off to any of their books. Not just Macmillan books but books published by any company. Here's the Guild's pitch:
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The Authors Guild is pleased to announce the launch of WhoMovedMyBuyButton.com, which is now live in fully-functional beta form. Who Moved My Buy Button? allows authors to keep track of whether Amazon has removed the "buy buttons" from any of their books.

Simply register the ISBNs of any books you'd like monitored, and our web tool will check daily to make sure your buy buttons are safe and sound. If there's a problem, we'll e-mail you an alert.

Although we've launched WhoMovedMyBuyButton.com in response to Amazon's wholesale removal of buy buttons from Macmillan titles, we believe Amazon should be monitored for years to come. Amazon's developed quite a fondness for employing this draconian tactic (there's a chronology at the website); it's only grown bolder with its growing market clout.

Vigilance is called for: sounding off is our best collective defense. Register your ISBNs today -- it's free and open to all authors, Guild members and not. (Though we'd prefer you join.)

Amazon/Macmillan Shopping Cart Watch

Day 8 - Buy Buttons Restored

And on the Seventh Day...

Some Macmillan authors are humming the World War II tune "When the Lights Go On Again All Over the World": Publishers Weekly issued a bulletin late Friday afternoon announcing that Amazon has begun restoring Buy Button service for Macmillan titles. "Although the buttons were not restored to all of its titles by late Friday afternoon, sources said an agreement has been completed and the e-tailer has begun putting back the direct buy option. It was not known if Macmillan offered any concessions to get the buttons restored."

Among the most relieved authors was Heidi Betts, whose Knock me for a Loop, the just-published third novel in a St. Martin's Press romance series with a knitting theme, was caught in the crossfire. Wall Street Journal reporters Jeffrey A. Trachtenberg and Geoffrey A. Fowler described her plight, but a visit to Loop and its companions yielded hot buy buttons but a paucity of information.

RC

Amazon/Macmillan Shopping Cart Watch

Day 7 - No Buy Button

Even during Lockout, Amazon Still Makes Money on Macmillan Titles

Though both Macmillan and Amazon are losing money in the current dispute, they are not losing it equally. Amazon's losses are ameliorated by the revenue generated by hosting the sale of new and used Macmillan titles by third-party booksellers. Amazon's commission on those sales is (from all we have been able to find out) somewhere between 3-4%. The publisher receives nothing from such resales, nor does the author.

Take for example The Politician by Andrew Young, a major casualty of the conflict. Published in January by St. Martin's Press, a division of Macmillan, this account of the John Edwards's sex scandal was blindsided by Amazon's removal of Macmillan's Buy buttons. You simply cannot buy it retail from Amazon. You can however buy it from Gkygrl, Rusty Cavalier, Gohastings or Johnglad. Those are the handles of booksellers offering new and used copies of The Politician on Amazon's buy-page for the book. Amazon will make a commission if those copies are sold. Not a large commission, true, but a commission nonetheless.

As of this writing there are 19 copies for sale via Amazon at prices ranging from $28.00 to $38.93, all above the St. Martin's $24.99 list price and ridiculously higher than Books-a-Million's $16.66 online price ($14.99 if you're a club member).

And that's just one Macmillan book on Amazon!

Richard Curtis

Now They are Three: Hachette Joins Apple "Agency" Model Bloc

Macmillan need not feel quite so alone in its quarrel with Amazon. A day or two ago Rupert Murdoch cast HarperCollins's lot with Apple's "agency" e-book retail model (see Apple Promoting a New (and Radical) Business Model for Selling E-Books?), a structure that threatens Amazon's hegemony in the e-reader space. Now Hachette has joined the bloc, meaning that half of the so-called Big Six want to recapture control over the timing and pricing of their e-books. Precincts yet to be heard from are Simon & Schuster, Random House and Penguin, but even without them, the forces arrayed under the agency model flag should signal the imminent capitulation of Amazon.

Wait a minute. Amazon did capitulate. They did it so long ago we forgot. (See If This Is Capitulation, What Does Triumph Look Like?)

In any event here is the statement issued to the literary agent community by David Young, Hachette Book Group's Chairman and CEO.

RC
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Dear Agent -

At Hachette Book Group, we have been considering a new pricing model for some time, and have decided to transition to selling our e-books through an agency model.

There are many advantages to the agency model, for our authors, retailers, consumers, and publishers. It allows Hachette to make pricing decisions that are rational and reflect the value of our authors’ works. In the long run this will enable Hachette to continue to invest in and nurture authors’ careers – from major blockbusters to new voices. Without this investment in our authors, the diversity of books available to consumers will contract, as will the diversity of retailers, and our literary culture will suffer.

The agency relationship will allow us to make more titles available to more consumers on more platforms. This expands the author’s reach and readership, which is at the heart of what we do as a publisher. Ultimately, these new terms open doors to all online e-book service providers and create more avenues for delivering e-books to readers.

Another great benefit to our consumers is that we intend to release HBG e-books simultaneously with the hardcover (or first format print edition).

It’s important to note that we are not looking to the agency model as a way to make more money on e-books. In fact, we make less on each e-book sale under the new model; the author will continue to be fairly compensated and our e-book agents will make money on every digital sale. We’re willing to accept lower return for e-book sales as we control the value of our product – books, and content in general. We’re taking the long view on e-book pricing, and this new model helps protect the long term viability of the book marketplace.

We believe that this new model is preferable to withholding books, and is in our authors’ and HBG’s best interest. I’m happy to answer individual questions about the agency model, so please don’t hesitate to contact me.

Best,

David Young
Chairman and Chief Executive Officer | Hachette Book Group

And The New Macmillan E-Book Royalty Is...

This just released from the Authors Guild.

In a letter just released by John Sargent, CEO of Macmillan, Sargent makes reference to discussions with the Authors Guild over Macmillan's e-book royalty structure. As you know, we criticized Macmillan in October over its proposed new e-book royalty rate of 20% of receipts.

In our discussions, Sargent agreed to "be flexible" on e-royalty rates, since current industry standards provide a royalty of 25% of receipts. The signal was quite clear that 25% was there for the asking. In further discussions on Monday, Sargent confirmed that Macmillan's standard e-book royalty would be 25% of receipts under their new boilerplate contract.

As we've said before, we believe that 25% of receipts is transitional royalty rate for e-books. From our December 15 e-mail alert on Random House's retroactive rights grab:

Authors and publishers have traditionally split the proceeds from book sales. Most sublicenses, for example, provide for a 50/50 split of proceeds, and the standard trade book royalty of 15% of the hardcover retail price, back in the days that industry standard was established, represented about 50% of the net proceeds of the sale of the book. We're confident that the current practice of paying 25% of net on e-books will not, in the long run, prevail. Savvy agents are well aware of this. The only reason e-book royalty rates are so low right now is that so little attention has been paid to them: sales were simply too low to scrap over. That's beginning to change... [W]e strongly suspect that e-royalty rates are at a low-water mark.

That said, Macmillan's e-book royalty rate is now similar to that of other major publishers. We look forward to continuing to discuss with Macmillan other provisions of its proposed new contract.
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That said...

As much as we appreciate the Authors Guild's role in pressing publishers for higher e-book royalties, we're not sure why Authors Guild has taken it upon itself to negotiate royalties with a publisher. Even though publishers, of late, have publicly announced their terms for e-books, neither authors nor agents are committed to accepting them. In fact, because of anti-trade statutes agents must exercise caution in doing anything that even appears to be negotiating contract terms as a single body.

And we do want to reiterate that neither authors nor agents should get comfortable with 25% of net as the "standard" royalty. Macmillan's increase to 25% has brought it into line with its Big Six playmates but that is no grounds for complacency among authors and agents. Indeed it could even be viewed with alarm. Beware of publishers marching in lockstep.

Richard Curtis

John Sargent: Macmillan Royalties Going Up

Were you one of the skeptics who faded me on my pinkie bet that e-book royalties would go up? Well, chum, you owe me a pinkie. Royalties are going up, at least at Macmillan. But even I'm stunned that it took only four days. I should have remembered that in the digital world, things that used to take two years now take two hours.

The revelation about a royalty boost was embedded in an update by CEO John Sargent on Macmillan's negotiations with Amazon in which he assured us that Amazon is "working very, very hard and in good faith" to resolve the issues that have stalemated publisher and retailer ever since Apple introduced a retail model that restores control, and ultimately more money, to publishers. Here's Sargent's full statement.

But if there has been no big breakthrough in Macmillan's relationship with its retailers, there's been a huge one in its relationship with authors and agents. Sargent says:

"And now on to royalties. Three or four weeks ago, we began discussions with the Author's Guild on their concerns about our new royalty terms. We indicated then that we would be flexible and that we were prepared to move to a higher rate for digital books. In ongoing discussions with our major agents at the beginning of this week, we began informing them of our new terms. The change to an agency model will bring about yet another round of discussion on royalties, and we look forward to solving this next step in the puzzle with you."

We'll review the sweetened royalty and report to you.

Richard Curtis

If This is Capitulation, What Does Triumph Look Like?

Are we capitulated yet? We know, we know, Jeff Bezos said "eventually", but we keep clicking on Publishers Lunch waiting for a bulletin that doesn't come. The Amazonian natives are getting restless, Kindle owners are exploring the trade-in market for the Apple iPad, Macmillan authors have climbed out on window ledges, and our industry is starting to get a collective public relations black eye. See Too good to be true? Amazon still hasn’t capitulated and that was two days ago.

Author Scott Westerfield issued a report that fairly assesses all the issues but ultimately supports Macmillan.

This is not a case of two corporations pissing down on us mere mortals with equal disdain; it's a case of complex negotiations in an ancient industry with many arcane traditions that's in a state of technological flux. And suddenly, out of the blue, one of the sides in this negotiation spat their pacifier across the room in a very public and embarrassing display of petulance. And that corporation was Amazon.

Yes, Amazon gets to set whatever prices it wants (free market!), but guess what, Macmillan also gets to release its electronic editions later if it feels simultaneous release is not in its best interests and those of its allies (free market again, sir!). Amazon gets to de-list an entire publisher if it wants to, even on a whim. But that's a massive free market fail, because we start to hate them and they have to back down two days later. And that's really the end of it: their strategy failed, because the rest of us can call shenanigans and take our business elsewhere. They aren't a monopoly yet.

Read Westerfeld's Amazon v Macmillan: free market fail.

RC

Amazon/Macmillan Shopping Cart Watch

Day 6 - No Buy Button