Technology • Innovation • Publishing — Issue #194
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Innovation
Apple has Won a Patent relating to Virtual Paper that will be used in AR and VR Environments — www.patentlyapple.com
Starbucks wants to become the gas station of the future for EVs — www.fastcompany.com
With 15,000 locations across the U.S., the coffee chain is betting it can convince electric vehicle owners that it’s the perfect place to charge up. (Literally!)
Technology
OpenSea is on a new quest to ban copymints, armed with AI, Twitter threads, and Discord chats
www.fastcompany.com
The world’s largest NFT platform is rolling out new safeguards to protect authenticity and build trust within the community.
Inside Elon Musk’s Big Plans for Twitter
“Data licensing” — that doesn’t sound good! Per the NYT, Here’s what Mr. Musk is projecting for Twitter’s finances over the next few years, according to a pitch deck he presented to investors.
How Starlink Scrambled to Keep Ukraine Online
www.wired.com
Elon Musk’s intervention demonstrates how satellite internet could route around war or censorship far beyond Ukraine.
UK reveals plans to force Google and Meta to pay for news
Google paying more than 300 EU publishers for news, more to come
www.reuters.com
Alphabet unit Google has signed deals to pay more than 300 publishers in Germany, France and four other EU countries for their news and will roll out a tool to make it easier for others to sign up too, the company told Reuters.
To improve publisher ad revenue, Google will begin rolling out optimized pricing by default
The feature is expected to increase the prices of publishers’ paid inventory without negatively affecting their overall earnings.
YouTube is testing a memberships gifting feature with select creators
Chicken Soup for the Soul Buys Redbox — www.bloomberg.com
Chicken Soup for the Soul Entertainment Inc. has acquired Redbox Entertainment Inc., a movies-to-rent streaming service that went public through a blank-check company last year, another sign that once-booming SPACs and the deals they fueled are losing steam.
Dirt, an entertainment and culture newsletter that was the first to fund itself solely through NFTs (selling more than $100K in NFT sales), raises a $1.2M seed to invest in more Web3 projects
Some Top 100,000 Websites Collect Everything You Type — Before You Hit Submit
www.wired.com
A surprising number of the top 100,000 websites effectively include keyloggers that covertly snag everything you type into a form.
Publishing & Media
Amazon added Epub support + removed Mobi support from its email conversion service
Did you know there’s a Tetris port for the Kindle?
Lagardere Board Considers Spinning Off Their Radio Group Into Separate Company to Protect Its “Autonomy” (Presumably from Conservative Vivendi Owner Bollore)
Legible offers a way for you to “curate your very own personalized ebook collections and share links to your curated bookshelves with the world.”
HT @BISG Per Pew Research, 64% of people 16+ get book recommendations from family, friends, or co-workers.
Trade facing industry-wide burnout, Bookseller survey finds
A survey by The Bookseller showed 89% of staffers had experienced stress during the course of their work over the last year, while 68% reported burnout and 64% said there was an impact on their mental health.
Publishing staffers surviving, not thriving as cost of living crisis bites, Bookseller survey finds, and many argue low wages are holding back diversity efforts
Life As a Book Publisher in Wartime Ukraine — lithub.com
Vivat is one of the largest publishers in Ukraine. In pre-war times, it published more than 400 new books each year.
War Sparks Interest in Ukrainian Poetry — www.publishersweekly.com
Christine Lysnewycz Holbert — the director of independent nonprofit poetry publisher Lost Horse Press and a daughter of Ukrainian refugees who came to the U.S. after WWII — discusses the press’s Contemporary Ukrainian Poetry Series.
Allen Lau Leaves Wattpad’s Top Spot; Jeanne Lam Remains in Place
Nice profile of Worldreaders founding
I liked reading their origin story.
Karnataka textbook printers pause operation amid paper shortage
HT @BISG Several textbook printers in Karnataka, India, temporarily suspended operations due to non-availability of raw materials + rising costs. For weeks, a number of printers have been unable to secure the paper needed to print these books from mills.
Author proofs hit eBay
Authors @JulieOwenMoylan and @cathryanhoward have recently tweeted about uncorrected copies of their novels available online.
Meet the New Old Book Collectors — www.nytimes.com
A growing cohort of young enthusiasts is helping to shape the future of an antique trade.
The Powerful, Complex Partnership Between Publishers and Libraries
Conservative parents take aim at library apps OverDrive & Epic, meant to expand access to books
www.nbcnews.com
E-reader apps that expand access to books for students are now under fire by conservative parents in a culture war over book bans in schools.
More than 25 Organizations Join ALA’s ‘Unite Against Book Bans’ Campaign— www.publishersweekly.com
“Our partners and supporters are critical in moving the needle to ultimately bring an end to book bans, said Deborah Caldwell-Stone, director of the ALA’s Office for Intellectual Freedom. “It’s time that policymakers understand the severity of this issue.” #UniteAgainstBookBans
Book Censorship News
MT @BookRiot This week’s book censorship news includes challenges in Vermont, Maine, Texas, and more. That, plus a guide to school board elections in four states (with more to come)
Dave Eggers, McSweeney’s Partnering with S.Dak. Indie to Distribute Free Banned Books
Baker & Taylor Launches Paw Prints Publishing, Children’s Imprint
75 books by Black authors released/releasing in 2022
Women’s Prize Trust unveils Discoveries longlist
www.thebookseller.com
The longlist for the Women’s Prize Discoveries programme has been revealed, in a year that sees entries from women aged between 65 to 74 exceed those in the 18–24 category.
Margaret Atwood: The Court Is Making Gilead Real — www.theatlantic.com
I thought I was writing fiction in The Handmaid’s Tale…. I stopped writing [Handmaid’s Tale] several times…I considered it too far-fetched. Silly me. Theocratic dictatorships do not lie only in the distant past: There are a number of them on the planet today. What is to prevent the US from becoming one?
Sarah Ferguson to pen three YA novels as part of 22-book deal — www.hellomagazine.com
Q: Can You Revoke a Creative Commons License? A: No. Er… Sort Of? Maybe? — The Scholarly Kitchen
HT @rharington A CC license is irrevocable; it says so right in the license. But it also says you can change your mind and distribute the work differently, or not at all. What does this mean? #copyright
The Accessiverse: On Accessible Comics
RT @ePubSecrets A brief overview of what is happening in the publishing landscape for accessible comics. #comics #GraphicNovels #a11y
Marie Claire owner Future has acquired Who What Wear, a US-based digital-only women’s lifestyle publisher
Bloomberg Media has unveiled Bloomberg UK, a new brand to take on the Financial Times and the Sunday Times
The Magazine Business, From the Coolest Place to the Coldest One — www.nytimes.com
ICYMI A new book about Anna Wintour and another by a longtime editor at Vanity Fair arrive amid the accelerating erosion of an industry.
Merger of News Media Alliance (NMA) and The Association of Magazine Media (MPA) is a go!
New association’s name adds a ‘slash’ becoming: News/Media Alliance.
What to Make of the Retreat of BuzzFeed New: It’s not really about Facebook or SPACs — it’s worse than that
RT @michellemanafy Buzzfeed came closer than almost anyone in news to being able to compete with Facebook, Google & Amazon — advertising’s contemporary oligopolists — for the sort of scale that might yield viability in the battle for ad dollars, but not close enough.
Resources & Opportunities
Cookbook Publishing Q&A with a Literary Agent 5/24 at 1pm ET
RT @SallyEkus
At-Home Rapid COVID Test Kit Distribution Program
MT @MarkLevineNYC Calling all community orgs in NYC: If your non-profit serves a high-needs neighborhood, especially one with limited testing capacity, you can sign up to distribute free home test kits in your community. (NYC how has a huge supply to give out).
Helping Families Find Infant Formula During the Shortage
If you can’t find infant formula for your baby, in the wake of Abbott Nutrition’s voluntary recall of certain powdered infant formulas, check this new HHS fact sheet with resources for locating safe formula.