BTW News Briefs

Random House Makes Free Digital Titles Available Via iPhone

Random House and Ballantine are making full-length books available for free on iPhone through Lexcycle Stanza, an electronic book reader for the Apple iPhone and iPod Touch. The promotion will give more than 500,000 Stanza users access to free eBooks from the backlist of a varied list of authors including Alan Furst, Julie Garwood, and Charlie Huston. The initial offerings will include excerpts from new hardcovers coming in 2009. Random House is providing links to chain retailers, Powells.com, and IndieBound.org to encourage readers to purchase more books by these authors.

Penguin Launches New Digital Program

On December 8, Penguin Group (USA) announced Penguin 2.0., a new digital publishing program. Accessible via a special mini-site, the program will include two digital initiatives: Penguin Personalized, which allows readers to add personal dedication pages to a variety of Penguin titles; and Penguin Mobile, which gives readers access to Penguin content from their iPhones and other web-enabled mobile devices. Additional features and programs, including social networking and community functionality, are planned.

BISG Releases BookDROP Technical Specification

BISG has released version 1.0 of the BookDROP technical specification, which is intended to support the search and discovery of digital book content on the Web. Developed jointly by the Book Industry Study Group and the Association of American Publishers, BookDROP defines a set of HTTP transactions between a publisher's digital book archive and the websites of the publisher's syndication partners. The overall goal of BookDROP is to encourage the discovery, search, browse, and distribution of digital book content across the Web while allowing publishers to manage the quality and availability of their content. The technical specification is freely available, along with background documents prepared by the AAP, from the BISG website.

Further Cuts and Freezes at Publishing Houses

Adding to last week's grim news about layoffs, reorganizations, and salary freezes at U.S. publishing houses, this week Chronicle Books laid off under five percent of its staff on Monday. According to Publishers Weekly company president Jack Jensen cited the economic outlook for 2009 and a planned reduction in Chronicle's adult output for 2010 as reasons for the cuts.

Also, this week, Macmillan and Perseus Books Group became the latest publishers to announce pay freezes. Macmillan announced a pay freeze for all employees earning over $50,000 that will begin January 1."For those making under $50,000 there will be a pool for modest increases. All bonus plans will stay in effect, but all are sensitive to individual company profitability and individual performance," according to a memo from Macmillan CEO John Sargent, posted on Gawker.

In addition to the pay freeze, Perseus is suspending contributions to employee retirement accounts and will not fill open staff positions.