All Episodes
A Textbook Case of Copyright Infringement?
Three leading education publishers have brought a copyright and trademark infringement suit against a U.S.-based textbook reseller for allegedly importing and selling "pirated" foreign editions of popular textbooks in the U.S. market. Filed in Massachusetts federal...
Business Readers In Search of Rigor And Relevance
What do readers hire us to do? The editors of one of the world’s most recognized and respected business publications asked themselves just that over five years ago. Answering the question inspired a transformation of the organization and a reinvention of the brand....
Mystery Author Flees Publisher
Authors discontented with their publishing deals are nothing new. Mark Twain enjoyed jabbing at publishers like a kid tossing stones. He said once that robbery of a publisher wasn’t a crime and was even rewarded in heaven with two halos. This week, a particularly...
Scholarly Publishing Looks To Close The Gender Gap
In a 2013 series of articles, Nature documented “the dismaying extent to which sexism still exists in science. In the United States and Europe, around half of those who gain doctoral degrees in science and engineering are female — but barely one-fifth of full...
Authors Reject “Forever” Contracts
True love, if you’re lucky enough to find it, lasts forever. So do diamonds, and even some tattoos. And for trade book authors, there are the contracts they sign with publishers. Earlier this week, the Authors Guild released the fourth installment of its Fair Contract...
Learning To Change
Change has come to publishing. That’s hardly a news flash. We are all familiar with the digital transformation of books and related media such as news. But the change that’s rarely spoken of is what happens to our work and our workplaces. Amy Wrzesniewski,...
More Books From Harper Lee, Please
In a week when Go Set A Watchman broke sales records, the book business might want to celebrate. Then again, it might not. Harper Lee’s second novel lay unpublished for more than 50 years. When it finally appeared, readers swooped upon the tale of Scout and Atticus...
Picture Perfect Fair Use?
When is a photograph not a photograph? When it is a work of art by Richard Prince, a master of rephotography and other appropriation practices. Riddles that puzzle over ownership and originality have preoccupied Richard Prince for four decades. Those same riddles,...
Watchman Heats Up Summer Sales
Many bestsellers are surprise hits, appearing almost out of nowhere to dominate and saturate. The latest blockbuster, though, was a guaranteed smash from the day this past winter when its publisher announced the title. Go Set a Watchman is only the second novel from...
Scott Stratten UnInterviewed
Picture Scott Stratten as a cross between a hipster and a revival preacher. Bearded and tattooed, he paces the stage for companies like PepsiCo, Adobe and the Red Cross, Hard Rock Cafe, and Cirque du Soleil, to evangelize for engagement. With a mission to promote the...
Appealing Apple Loses Again
Courtrooms figure prominently yet again in the latest book world news, while one innovative online service struggles to balance costs and customer demand. In New York City, the Second Circuit Court of Appeals, by a 2–1 margin, affirmed Judge Denise Cote’s 2013 finding...
Best of BTB: Content, Copyright & (Global) Commerce
Across the world of publishing, change is underway. Book publishing and distribution are fundamentally different than even a few years ago – and opportunity at a global scale is available to all sizes of publishers. With a combination of digitally-driven...