News Roundup: Publishers Push to Meet Russert Book Demand, Seth Godin's Kindle Analysis, BN.com Redesign Nets Big Traffic

Mac Slocum
June 20, 2008 | Permalink | Comments (0) | Listen

Publishers Pushing to Meet Russert Book Demand

Random House and Hyperion Books are rushing to meet demand for Tim Russert's two books, Wisdom of Our Fathers and Big Russ & Me. From Newsday:

Carol Schneider, executive director of publicity at Random House, reports that the company is immediately printing 100,000 paperbacks of "Wisdom" that began shipping yesterday [6/16/08].

Likewise, Hyperion Books has gone back to press for another 100,000 copies of "Big Russ," according to Beth Gebhard, executive director of publicity. (Continue reading)

Seth Godin: Community and Interactivity Would Benefit Kindle

Seth Godin weighs in with random thoughts on the Kindle, including:

The Kindle does a fine job of being a book reader, and a horrible job of actually improving the act of reading a book.

Godin says the Kindle reading experience -- particularly with non-fiction titles -- would benefit from reader recommendations, Digg-style voting, and hyperlinks. (Continue reading)

BN.com Redesign Nets Significant Traffic Increase

Barnes and Noble is seeing positive results from its 2007 Web site overhaul. From Publishers Weekly:

... in 2007, the online arm of the retailer posted a 10.1% sales increase, helped by a strong fourth quarter, and the solid results continued into the first period of 2008: B&N.com posted a 7.2% sales increase, compared to an increase of 1.1% for the stores. (Continue reading)

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