TOC 2008 Just Around the Corner

Andrew Savikas
January 31, 2008 | Permalink | Comments (0) | Listen

On the Radar backchannel, Make's Phil Torrone shared a link about how author Paulo Coelho has "pirated" his own book using file sharing, with surprising results:

[U]ploading the Russian translation of “The Alchemist” made his sales in Russia go from around 1,000 per year to 100,000, then a million and more.

The use of technology like digitization, file sharing, the Internet is contributing to dramatic changes happening to the business of publishing. We launched the O'Reilly Tools of Change for Publishing conference last year (video on blip) to help publishers -- ourselves included -- begin to make sense of these changes. The name TOC (which publishing folks may recognize as the common acronym for a table of contents) was a nod to our intention to see the conference set the agenda for the future of publishing. We couldn't have said it better than TOC speaker Kirk Biglione:

TOC has emerged as the premier conference (possibly the only conference) designed to help book publishers come to terms with the range of technologies that are transforming their industry.

The second TOC conference is now barely two weeks away. You can preview the schedule and tutorials at the conference web site. This year's program includes several audience favorites from last year (including guaranteed profitability in publishing, hot new gadgets, and SEO (search engine optimization for publishers), and I'm thrilled about all of the new additions and speakers, including Seth Godin, Publishers Weekly editor-in-chief Sara Nelson, and Lulu.com founder Bob Young.

Right now, you can get a 20% discount when you register using discount code toc08rdr. TOC 2008 is Feb. 11-13 in New York City.

P.S. -- We're closing day two of the conference with another crowd favorite, a panel discussion with a group of teens. If you know any teens in the New York area interested in participating, drop me a line at toc AT oreilly.com

Amazon Acquires Audible

Andrew Savikas
January 31, 2008 | Permalink | Comments (0) | Listen

On the heels of news that Amazon is struggling to keep up with demand for the Kindle (I ordered mine three weeks ago, and still no word on ship date), comes word that they're acquiring Audible.

Along with the Kindle, this move makes sense for the online retailer as a bet that demand will continue to grow for books in non-print formats. I'm interested to see if Amazon creates a self-publishing audiobook platform similar to what they've created for the Kindle. That kind of blurring of the lines between retailer, distributor, and publisher is something that makes many in publishing more than a little nervous.