Encyclopedia Britannica
will no longer publish print editions after more than 244 years of doing so, the
NYT first reported Tuesday with an advance look at the press release, with
the 32-volume set published in 2010 deemed to be its last-ever. (That edition
has sold just 8,000 copies, a far cry from Britannica's peak in 1990, when
120,000 sets sold; there are another 4,000 copies of the 2010 edition still
sitting in the company's warehouse.) Instead Britannica will concentrate on its
online business and a wide range of editorial products, including several
different digital versions of Encyclopedia that has, to date, sold more than
100 million copies worldwide.
"The end of the print set is something
we’ve foreseen for some time," Britannica president Jorge Cauz said in
a statement. "It's the latest step in our evolution from the print
publisher we were, to the creator of digital learning products we are
today." As part of the announcement the entire contents of Britannica.com
are available for free this week.
Austrian publishing house Vieser Werlag has
declared bankruptcy after more than 24 years in business, with debts of more
than 865,000 euros. Founder and publisher Lozje Weiser told the Salzburger
Nachrichten that he will continue to lead the company after the
reorganization process and that there are several offers from prospective
buyers being entertained. Vieser Werlag published more than 1,000 books,
largely specializing in Eastern European fiction.
In something of an about-face, PayPal has revised
its policy against processing sales of ebooks containing themes of rape,
bestiality or incest after protests from authors and anti-censorship activist
groups. Now the company, a spokesman told
the Chicago Tribune, will only block payments for books containing illegal
images and those that depict child pornography and will concentrate on
individual ebooks instead of whole categories. PayPal's policy change also
comes as spokespeople for Visa and Mastercard reiterated that they "would
take no action regarding lawful material that seeks to explore erotica in a
fictional or educational manner."
NYT bestselling author Scott Sigler will
publish paperbacks of his self-published YA sports/sci-fi series the GALACTIC
FOOTBALL LEAGUE through a new agreement with Diversion Books (which will use
Perseus for distribution). Sigler's adult books are represented by Byrd Leavell
at the Waxman Literary Agency, the affiliate company of Diversion. The books
were not shopped to traditional publishers. Sigler's Dark Øverlord Paperback
will be an imprint of Diversion Books and the first two books in the series are
set for release this August.
In what's otherwise a fairly vanilla piece
on how e-readers are fueling a growth in erotic romance, the
WSJ reports that HarperCollins UK will launch a new digital imprint devoted
to erotica, Mischief Books, on March 27. The new imprint will
start out with 13 original titles priced at £1.99 and will also reissue
backlist titles, all sold through its website and via Amazon and Apple.
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