publishing industry
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Women Writers Gain Popularity, But Men Still Lead Industry
Women writing about women is popular right now in the publishing world—like Emma Cline, who recently released The Girls. USA Today runs through the many books about women, by women. But despite the rising popularity of these authors and the prominence…
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Self-Publishing Vs. Traditional Publishing
Who hasn’t felt that awkward moment between laughing and crying when the question, “do writers make money?” pops up? Unlike movie-makers and musicians, exact figures for authors’ earnings have always been notoriously difficult to retrieve. However, with the advent of Amazon’s…
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No Context, No Clue
An ad campaign by Penguin Random House in the UK meant to intrigue readers into purchasing classic books has instead sparked controversy for being anti-Russian. The ad features an unattributed line from the novel Fathers and Sons by Ivan Turgenev: “Aristocracy, liberalism, progress, principles… Useless…
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Overtime Changes Could Upend Publishing Industry Norms
Changes to overtime laws could have a big impact the way the publishing industry pays staff. Salaried employees earning less than $47,476 a year will be entitled to overtime pay at a rate of one and a half times their…
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Whisper Sweet Nothings
With every year you can hear a celebrity narrate Moby-Dick for $14.95, audiobook sales account for increasingly greater shares of publishing houses’ revenues. Listen up.
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The Great Film Festival Swindle
“Never pay an entry fee. If they won’t give you a waiver they aren’t interested in the film.”—Programmer for a major film festival
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Can Unions Diversify Publishing?
The publishing industry is very white—79% as of 2016. One way to change that might be to unionize publishing workforces, argues J.C. Pan at The Nation. Pan cites the unionization of The New Press, where workers included an affirmative-action clause in…
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Serendipity in Life and Literature
Be unpredictable, including to yourself. So there’s the question of how do you go about finding things—or better their finding you? You have to be open to surprise and at the same time assiduous in pursuing the things you are…
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Reading the Fine Print
Traditional publishers provide many services for authors, including fact-checking and obtaining permission for intellectual property. Self-publishing platforms don’t provide these services, and because of a recent court ruling, aren’t responsible for mistakes made by authors. The National Law Review looks…
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Publishing Industry’s Diversity Limits Revealed
JK Rowling has published rejection letters she received writing under the name Robert Galbraith. Rowling has racked up book sales worth billions for the Harry Potter series, but set out to see if she could sell a novel without Potter’s help.…
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We Need Diverse Publishers
According to Publishers Weekly, publishing is so white because publishers—particularly the Big Five—have failed to implement concrete plans to diversify their hires. One publishing HR exec said that even though hiring quotas are risky and make people uncomfortable, an alternate…
