PEOPLE Two major magazine publishers announce new hires: Linda Cunningham, most recently Publisher of Questia Media, has been named Editor-in-Chief of Meredith Books in Des Moines. . . Sara Levinson has been named to the newly created position of President of the Women’s Group at Rodale. She will oversee magazines, books, and websites in this…Continue Reading
PEOPLE We will skip over the Thomas Middelhoff debacle, and move on to some moves that are less well covered, including that by a Middelhoff chronicler: The NYT’s David Kirkpatrick is leaving the Book Beat, to cover media, focusing on AOL Time Warner, along with Vivendi, Bertelsmann, and News Corp. His replacement will be named…Continue Reading
The London Book Fair has, like its sister Reed-sponsored show, BEA, extended its dates in recent years. This year’s expo was two-and-a-half days long, but with the accompanying ebook and subrights conferences, ended up sprawling from March 14th to the 19th. The conferences had a tough time pulling the crowds that LBF continues to pack…Continue Reading
By now the rise of books about the Mideast and the fall of just about everything else has been well documented by The New York Times and Publishers Weekly. Many reasons have been cited: the abrupt cancellation of tours; the general lack of promotion and concurrent lack of reader attention; the economy; and fear, any…Continue Reading
PEOPLE Congrats to Phyllis Grann — and Random House — who have finally tied the knot in what is perhaps the last good news of ’01? Word is that not all publishers there are equally excited, leading to speculation about whether the last card has yet been played. Back at Penguin Putnam, Adrian Zackheim has…Continue Reading
PEOPLE Layoffs are the order of the day, though mergers, not the economy, seem to be the main reason. DK has laid off about 25 people, with more to come. Meanwhile, the move down to Hudson Street has been postponed, apparently as a cost-savings measure. No word yet on Phyllis Grann’s plans, though Random House…Continue Reading
When You Care Enough to Give the Very Best With Your Galley ORIGINALLY PUBLISHED AT INSIDE.COM (6/2/01) CHICAGO — According to a recent survey, interest in e-books is minimal, and recent figures suggest that retail sales of books are flat. But that hasn’t stopped publishers from hyping their new books, whatever it takes. And what…Continue Reading
ORIGINALLY PUBLISHED AT INSIDE.COM (4/26/01) Battered by the rise of Internet retailing, skewered by deep-discount bookselling chains and wounded by waves of sweepstakes scandals, the mail-order book publishing business has been hit hard, as customers have become increasingly cynical about their responsibility to pay up, return promptly and — above all — remain loyal to…Continue Reading
PEOPLE Candy Lee, formerly CEO of Troll Communications, has joined iFormation Group as the MD of Sales & Marketing. Launched in June 2000, iFormation is a partnership of The Boston Consulting Group, General Atlantic Partners, and Goldman Sachs that partners with “the world’s leading companies by investing in and operating new technology businesses that leverage…Continue Reading
Is the Grass Really Greener In the Internet Economy? As Ross Perot might have said, there’s a giant sucking sound sluicing toward Silicon Alley. And as anyone in publishing will tell you, the by now epic saga of dot-com defection — young turks storming out of investment banks, law clerks leaping like lemmings into the…Continue Reading
