Ebooks at Dyman Associates Publishing Inc A Plea: Let Some Ebook Data Flow

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Historically, when all others are concentrating on lowering costs, quality wins.

Publishers with a laser focus on improving the reader experience win over those focused on saving pennies per page. There is an appetite for quality enhanced ebooks at a premium (e.g. audio books, companions).

But it’s not necessarily about simply improving the multimedia experience. The best way to improve revenues, stickiness, and loyalty has always been to ask the customer. Customer data is the best indicator of what does and doesn’t work.

Imagine being able to factor in the subtleties of your readers’ experience. What parts of the book did they like and at what parts did they struggle to keep reading? Which sample of the book led to more sales?  Did they finish the book? If so, how long did it take and what were the sticking points? Who is my audience?

The problem with surveying customers is that the sample size of data is typically too small to warrant rewrites. But ebooks afford us the opportunity to capture this data automatically. In fact, the EPUB3 format allows for embedded JavaScript, so we can leverage some of the same type of detailed analytics we get from web pages (that have been optimized and improved for years) – for ebooks.

Yes, there are privacy concerns. Yes, there are data-ownership questions. Yes, there are platform wars. These are strong forces that have brought down laudable efforts to bring this data to authors, such as Hiptype (a short-lived startup that cracked the problem but was strategically blocked by larger forces).

Platforms are not to be blamed, nor are privacy activists. Their assertions and efforts on behalf of the data and readers are valid. But there is a common understanding that our written word could be improved by what is effectively the best possible peer review system available – a mass contingency of actual consumers. And that little “e” in ebooks allows us to dynamically make changes.

So what’s the answer?

There is common ground between data-driven publishing geeks (such as myself), privacy activists, authors, and platform owners. For example, we can all agree that if most students are incorrectly answering the questions at the end of a lesson, changes likely need to be made. Customer data does not have to include personal information, nor does it have any particular value by itself. However, an author/editor would find it invaluable. The ebook could be improved, the lesson would be more valuable, and scores of students would understand trigonometry better than I.

If we can all agree on sharing some of the most basic data elements (perhaps just with the Publisher and Author for the express use of improving quality and conversion), all parties win. Readers will have a better experience, authors will have created a better product, and publishers will increase sales. Best of all, platforms that make such data available would attract more authors and publishers.

The data-driven publishing movement is a strong current that we can control by defining what data is shared, with whom and for what purpose. Building a dam to stop all data is a detriment to readers, students, publishers, authors, and platform owners.

It’s time to open the flood gates and let some data flow. See other book reviews at Dyman Associates Publishing Inc.

 

Ebooks at Dyman Associates Publishing Inc Brought to Book: Linda Spalding on her literary life

‘I had to remould my brain to write “The Follow”. It involved three trips to Borneo and years of reading and studying and thinking hard about human beings and our place in the natural world’

Linda Spalding: “Since no Irish author could be overrated, they must all be underrated. Ireland is the origin of authorial species.” Photograph: Jeff Nolte

This article is a repost from irishtimes.com

Linda Spalding won the 2012 Canadian governor-general’s award for The Purchase (Sandstone Press, £8.99), and was longlisted for the IMPAC award. In this provocative and starkly beautiful historical novel, a Quaker family moves from Pennsylvania to the Virginia frontier, where slaves are the only available workers and where the family’s values and beliefs are sorely tested. Spalding was born in Kansas and now lives in Toronto. She is married to fellow novelist Michael Ondaatje.

What was the first book to make an impression on you?

There were two in my early childhood. The first was about a white rabbit and a black rabbit who were not allowed to be friends. This was written in the 1940s and must have been radical at the time since the rabbits prevailed. The second was called The Bear That Wasn’t – and it is such a classic that I’ve persuaded the New York Review of Books to republish it.

What was your favourite book as a child?

No contest. I read and reread A Little Princess by Frances Hodgson Burnett a thousand times. This was the edition with the wonderful coloured glossy pictures and it surely provided all the direction I needed for later life

And what is your favourite book or books now?

That would be a contest! I’m reading Willa Cather at the moment and finding new depth in her view of the world, but my reading is varied and constant and my favourite all-round author is John Ehle, who is the most under-rated of American authors.

What is your favourite quotation?

“Why is there something rather than nothing?” Liebnitz

Who is your favourite fictional character?

At the moment, I’d vote for my very own Daniel.

Who is the most under-rated Irish author?

Since no Irish author could be overrated, they must all be underrated. Ireland is the origin of authorial species.

Which do you prefer – ebooks or the traditional print version?

But of course I prefer books. They smell good (usually) and I like the touch of paper to finger. Some are too heavy, unwieldy, but at least I know where I am and what progress is still to be made and I can reread sentences as I like, look for lost names and check the author’s photograph now and then for a sense of friendliness.

What is the most beautiful book you own?

A beautiful question! I have a very, very old book of Hunting and Hawking , but the most beautiful and most precious book I have is a letter press limited edition of Michael’s [Ondaatje’s] Tin Roof , published by Greenboathouse Press. Thick rust-coloured fold-over covers, black end papers and pages that feel like they’ve grown in a wild forest of white leaves. This book is very personal to me but is an astounding object to read and hold dear.

Where and how do you write?

Just about anywhere but I’m happiest in my upstairs study at home in Toronto. That’s where all my books and toys and photos are.

What book changed the way you think about fiction?

Move Over Midnight, by Jean Rhys

What is the most research you have done for a book?

I had to remould my brain to write The Follow. It involved three trips to Borneo and years of reading and studying and thinking hard about human beings and our place in the natural world.

What book influenced you the most?

Long ago I read all of Oscar Lewis, who translated first-person accounts of people of all types and classes in Mexico. His integrity, his standing aside to let them speak, changed my way of looking at the world.

What book would you give to a friend’s child on their 18th birthday?

Oh but that depends on the child! At that age I loved Hermann Hesse, but for a special child I might choose The Notebooks of Malte Laurids Brigge by Rilke. It formed a bond between me and my step-son when he was that age. But … hard to know what this generation would care to read ….

What book do you wish you had read when you were young?

The Adventures of King Arthur and the Knights of the Round Table

What advice would you give to an aspiring author?

Read. Read well. Write. Rewrite.

What weight do you give reviews?

I like to know how my own books are perceived. I admit to using reviews at times to choose what I might read next.

Where do you see the publishing industry going?

The industry is struggling. Perhaps there are too many books! I sometimes wonder about that when I enter the few remaining bookstores and see them piled high with what appears to be crap. But marketing a good book is a nightmare. Everything these days comes down to marketing and distribution and how is anyone to know which books are worth reading? The publishers have to find real authors, edit them, produce the books and then find some way in this crazy marketplace to tell people about them. It’s a lot to expect!

What writing trends have struck you lately?

God, I’m not sure what a writing trend is….

What lessons have you learned about life from reading?

Well, we have our heroes as we go along. Hesse, Montaigne, Emerson – when I was young. Everything I read teaches me something. That’s why I do it.

What has being a writer taught you?

Which writers, living or dead, would you invite to your dream dinner party?

I once met Doris Lessing and was so excited I grabbed a drink out of another guest’s hand and gave it to her. I’ll ask Doris and Emily Dickinson and Emily Bronte. I think they’d like each other. Lady Murasaki would be the guest of honour and we’d have a fine translator at her side who would also pour her tea.

What is the funniest scene you’ve read?

Maybe Michael reading aloud from Moss Hart’s Act One

What is your favourite word?

Connubial

If you were to write a historical novel, which event or figure would be your subject?

I think I did sort of write a historical novel, although I didn’t call it that at the time. It’s about my Quaker abolitionist ancestor, who bought a slave in 1798. It’s called The Purchase.

In this corner Ebooks at Dyman Associates Publishing Inc, is where you can do your tasting (and even do your shopping) of books. Dig in!