Copyright Clearance Center's Beyond the Book program explores issues facing the information content industry and helps creative professionals realize the full potential of their works, while encouraging respect for intellectual property and the principles of copyright.
BTB #173: An Information Dream
Dennie Heye of Shell in the Netherlands, and Stephen Kizza, a librarian with the Ministry of Energy and Mineral Resources in Kampala, Uganda, began their information sharing adventure with just two shelves and two computers. Working together, and with the help of Special Libraries Association colleagues around the world, they continue to supply Kizza’s remote library with online resources. In a “Beyond the Book” episode from November 2009, the two email correspondents first heard each other’s voices.
Beyond the Book’s Chris Kenneally moderated a discussion about best practices in global information sharing at SLA 2010, with Dennie Heye, and Guy St. Clair of SMR Knowledge who is also an SLA past president and had ecently returned from a six-month assignment in Nairobi. “Probably the most humbling and the most exciting prospect that I see is the passionate desire of our colleagues in developing countries to match as closely as they can the work that we?re able to do in our knowledge centers, our specialized libraries, information centers,” St.Clair said.
And while Stephen Kizza could not attend this month’s annual SLA conference in New Orleans, his voice was heard in a moving presentation on the needs and challenges he and so many librarians in developing countries face.
BTB #172: Publishing ‘Indies’ To Seek Certification
Digital technology and changing consumer habits are helping drive growth in independent publishing. But as Scott Flora sees it, that success can be made stronger with an educational program that “creates a [new] class of independent publishers who are recognized for their professionalism and the excellence of their product.”
Certification is a common way for trade associations to show who’s professional in that trade: CFPs, RNs, MDs., etc. “Our idea,” says SPAN’s Executive Director, is to establish “a class of publishers that stand above the crowd.” With a working designation of Professional Independent Publisher (PIP), the program aims to overcome a number of problems well-known to the industry. “With the dilemma facing the media and the supply chain in identifying quality publishers and the difficulties of independent publishers in finding publicity and distribution, I am excited to have SPAN leading this important work,” Flora tells Chris Kenneally.
Winoca Book & Media founder Barbara Brannon seconds the notion. Certification, she hopes will inform “booksellers, and reviewers, and libraries, and ultimately readers that we’re in this, not only for the creativity, but for the purpose of producing a professional product.”
BTB #171: ‘Obama Book Club’ Meets At BookExpo
White House administrations generate books like leaves grow on trees. Only 18 months into the Barack Obama presidency, and already the titles are flourishing in publishers’ catalogs. Two of the most anticipated such books – THE PROMISE: President Obama, Year One, just arrived from Newsweek columnist Jonathan Alter, and the forthcoming OVERHAUL: Inside the Obama Administration’s Mission to Save The American Automotive Industry by Steven Rattner who led the federal government’s restructuring of Chrysler and General Motors – were feted at the recent BookExpo America.
In a special “Author Stages” discussion, Alter and Rattner spoke with Chris Kenneally about how President Obama tackles the myriad challenges he has faced since his historic inauguration.
BTB #170: Copyright & Corporate Culture
The challenge of the Digital Age is the ubiquity of content. And for businesses and research institutions, what you don’t know about copyright when it comes to digital content can create problems. Robin Neidorf, lead researcher and general manager for Free Pint Ltd., a UK-based publisher of resources, publications, sites and reports serving the global information industry, has just published a 
“Copyright Policies and Practices” research study to learn how organizations today are training employees to minimize infringement risk… or not (the report is available here for free). She spoke with Chris Kenneally about the gap in corporate culture between practice and policy.
Best of BTB: Cory Doctorow Plays ‘The Price Is Right’ For E-Books
Sounding more like a college economics professor than a bestselling sci-fi author, Cory Doctorow offers his suggestions for how publishers should arrive at the “right price” for e-books. As for copyright, he defends “fair use” and questions strict interpretations of the phrase, “all rights reserved.”
For publishers, authors and their readers, 2010 will likely go down as the year when e-books finally and decisively won a permanent place in the literary hierarchy. At Beyond the Book, we’re following this story from a number of angles, and we will continue this special coverage in coming weeks with a focus series on e-books.
Meanwhile, our regular reporting on the publishing and media industry continues here at Beyond the Book.
Live Webcast: E-MAGINATION: What’s Now and What’s Next in Ebooks
Sponsored by the Independent Book Publishers Association
The e-revolution is upon us. What do authors and publishers need to know to come out on top?
On Monday, May 24 at 2:30PM Eastern, in a special Webcast LIVE to the world from Publishing University, a panel of digital pioneers and industry prophets weigh in on a host of e-issues to help you formulate your e-strategy right now. Emceed and podcasted LIVE from New York’s Roosevelt Hotel by Chris Kenneally of CCC’s Beyond the Book.
Watch this event as it happens on the Beyond the Book Live Webcast page.
BTB #169: Beyond Print & Paper
The flow of e-reader devices onto the consumer market has quickly shifted from a trickle to a flood. With consumers captivated by the iPad, nook, Kindle, Skiff Reader, and QUE, a massive surge in demand for digitally distributed content is inevitable. As a result, those who write and publish are struggling with a new wave of questions. How will device pricing models affect contracts and content ownership? How will copyrights be enforced in increasingly blogged, socialized, and cross-linked world? How can an author distribute their own work without compromising themselves or their publishing agreements? What will the e-book wars mean to writers and publishers? How can publishers broaden distribution without increasing risk?
On May 20th at the Samsung Experience in New York’s Time Warner Center, Chris Kenneally examined these and other questions with Andrew Richard Albanese, writer and features editor for Publishers Weekly; Rachel Chou, Chief Marketing Officer for Open Road Integrated Media; and attorney Kathleen Conkey (former in-house attorney at MTV Networks,CBS and King World Productions).
(more…)
BTB #168: Drafting the Next New Media Contract
Preferring to think about “evolving” media, rather than any “new vs. old” dichotomy, a quartet of attorneys with deep experience in the media industry joined Chris Kenneally at the recent Digital Hollywood conference to discuss the do’s and don’ts and “gotchas” of the latest in contract negotiations.
Panelists included Cindy Charles, Senior Vice President and General Counsel, MediaNet; Alan Friel, Partner,Wildman, Harrold, Allen & Dixon LLP; John M. Gatti, Partner, Stroock & Stroock & Lavan LLP; and Virginie L. Parant, partner, Artist Law Group.
Clearly, Hollywood has come a long way from the days when Samuel Goldwyn could say, “A verbal contract isn’t worth the paper it’s written on.”
BTB #167: ‘All Access Pass’ For Global Science
“What goes around, comes around” may well serve as the motto of an effort undertaken by the International Association of Scientific, Technical & Medical Publishers (STM) to provide access to premium online research journals in developing nations. Research4Life is the collective name for three public-private partnerships which seek to help achieve the UN’s Millennium Development Goals by providing the developing world with access to critical scientific and social science research. Beginning in 2002, the three programs: Health Access to Research Initiative (HINARI); Access to Global Online Research in Agriculture (AGORA); and Online Access to Research in the Environment (OARE), have given researchers at 4,500 institutions in 108 developing countries free or low cost access to over 7,000 journals provided by the world’s leading academic and professional publishers.
As STM’s Maurice Long explains for Chris Kenneally, “The things we in the USA, the United Kingdom, Europe, Australia take for granted as being very cheap – airline travel, Internet – are very, very expensive things in the developing world, enormously expensive. And the infrastructure is sometimes very weak in terms of electrical supply.” The ambitious goal of Reseach4Life is more than to be charity, however, but to help make it possible that researchers in Africa, Asia, and South America can contribute back to the publications vital research and insights of their own. “The ingenuity of researchers, librarians, is quite amazing,” Long says. “We are fairly confident that what is being done in developing countries now will find its way into these publications.”
Copyright Clearance Center’s Deanna Wamae recently traveled to the Dominican Republic for a HINARI training session. “We heard from students and from researchers that through being able to access this content, they begin to feel confident about using it and absorbing it and understanding how, then, to produce content. As a result, they can begin to shape the scientific dialogue in the world.”
BTB #166: More Content, More Screens, More Questions
Author and digital media authority Bill Rosenblatt examines how the proliferation of mobile phones and other networked devices is giving rise to an accompanying mobile screen culture – and what publishers need to do to survive and thrive in such an environment. A special presentation from Copyright Clearance Center’s Educational Services team.
To access a copy of Bill Rosenblatt’s just-published white paper, The New Content Monetization Opportunities for Publishers, go to www.copyright.com and in the Latest News and Events section, click “White Paper: New Content Monetization Opportunities for Publishers.” You will have the opportunity to complete a brief survey to help us develop future educational programming, and you will be provided with instant access to Bill’s paper.
On May 19 at the Manhattan Theatre Source in New York City, Bill Rosenblatt will a free interactive workshop on content monetization strategies, sponsored by content monetization and delivery solutions provider Atypon.
