Digital Book World is back in NYC after an absence of six years. Since Bradley Metrock bought the program and moved it to Nashville, it has evolved into a great place for publishers and vendors to see how technology is changing – and will change – the industry. From AI-narrated audiobooks to the melding of podcasts with audiobooks and the rise of ChatGPT and blockchain, the conference attempted to cover it all. While many of the presentations were thinly disguised pitches, the quality of most of the products was high enough to warrant a listen. Among those presenters and products that Publishing Trends found particularly alluring were:
- Taylan Kamis and DeepZen, a purveyor of AI-based audiobook narrations in multiple languages. Because narrators’ voices, along with purely digitized voices, can be used, the stigma of robotic speech no longer applies.
- Adam Fritz of Canada-based Pozotron, another evangelist focused on audiobook production using AI.
- Javier Celaya, CEO, of Dosdoce, who talked about podcasts and how they could be easily turned into books. They can also be used to introduce a younger generation to audiobooks; only 20% of 18-to-35 year-old podcast listeners also listen to audiobooks.
- BISG Rights Committee chair Kris Kliemann, who assembled a panel of subrights experts to discuss how, especially in a world where content is available in multiple formats and languages (not to mention fonts), selling and tracking rights is critical. As Clare Hodder from RightsZone explained it, “If you’re in publishing, you’re in rights.”
There were few traditional publishers on the panels, or even in the audience. One of those who made it was Mary McAveney, newly appointed CEO of Abrams, who talked with Bradley Metrock about what the future may bring for publishers. Coming from OpenRoad, she is focused on learning who Abrams’ readers are and how best to reach them “on a one-to-one level.” When asked what she thought of ChatGPT, her response was, “How can we harness it?” In the next breath she suggested that “catalog copy is the perfect job” for the chatbot.
PageMajik’s Ashok Giri took the challenge even further in his talk “Trends in Content Creation Using AI and Smart Technology.” Using it, he said, “we become lazy, or we can become more productive.” He noted that ChatGPT provides shortcuts that free the user up to do other things, and insights that the writer might not have reached without it. The company blog for January 18th, which discusses the ways in which it will be a useful tool was – of course — written by ChatGPT.
Book.io co-founder Joshua Stone provided the audience with the most sweeping opportunities brought on by the use of blockchain technologies. “IP,” said Stone, “will have a significantly higher value; this is the golden age of publishing.”
In this golden age, books can be created, published, sold and tracked through multiple owners, which means authors and publishers can be paid over time; Ingram (an investor) has partnered with Book.io on a “mint and print” operation where books and ebooks can be bundled together in ways that make a distinct and original unit. Multiple book covers can be generated, to appeal to a variety of audiences, and – hard to believe in the wake of crypto scandal – fraud and counterfeiting will be eliminated.
Some traditional vendors had innovations to unveil as well. Overdrive, which reaches an astounding 88,000 libraries and schools in 109 countries, has a success story in its EdTech outreach efforts with the student reading app Sora. Creating a new lending model through its on-demand “class sets” has allowed teachers to provide a title in multiple translations to the entire class for a limited time. Capstone Publishing’s CEO, Randi Economou, and CMO, John Costilla, also discussed their innovations in the EdTech space, providing students with multi-format learning experiences through Capstone Connect.
Even though it’s known as the Creator Economy, Jane Friedman’s panel was focused more specifically on newsletters and the difficulties involved with monetizing them. Each platform has a different model which has evolved in order to provide writers with greater support, but writing for a living requires, as publisher of Oldster, Sari Botton, said, “having another job” to pay the bills. Friedman’s HotSheet wasn’t discussed, but it’s both successful and “must” reading (and has a write up of DBW this week).
Other sessions that we didn’t attend have been covered elsewhere (see below), and some sessions were informative but not as newsworthy: Pete McCarthy on Open Road and Wade Lucas on BookBub, explained their respective usefulness to publishers in promoting backlist, for instance. The bulleted companies above, however, broke some new ground that is relevant to the industry.
Meanwhile, we were amused to learn that anyone tempted to go on to ChatGPT to find out what the fuss is about is getting the message: “ChatGPT is at capacity right now: Get notified when we’re back.” So much for the infinite potential of the digital world.
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