Sales have doubled in the past five years, with commuters and men aged 25 to 44 accounting for the bulk of purchases. But many of us are unable to finish them – so here are a few you won’t give up onNo longer just the greatest invention for bathtub readers, the audiobook is, according to new data, the surprise saviour for solving one of the world’s greatest problems: getting non-readers to read. Sales of audiobooks have doubled in the past five years, according to Nielsen Bookscan figures revealed at the London Book Fair this week, with commuters and men aged 25 to 44 accounting for the bulk of that rise.But presumably factors other than fidgety, word-averse men are also at play. Perhaps the astronomic rise of the podcast over the last decade has made everyone more audio-friendly. Since Amazon bought Audible in 2008 for $300m, the retail giant has also been flinging cash at the form with wild abandon, as free and ambitious as Stephen Fry’s reading of Harry Potter (don’t worry if you’ve only started, his slightly ropey Hermione gets better). Continue reading... Continue reading at 'The Guardian'
[ The Guardian | 2018-04-09 00:00:00 UTC ]
When is a book not a book? When it is performed by a starry cast of hundreds. Except it has always been more complicated than thatNews this week of a 17% hike in the UK’s audiobook sales might seem like a niche business story, but it raises an existential question. What exactly is an audiobook... Continue reading at The Guardian
[ The Guardian | 2024-05-10 17:25:03 UTC ]
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The books will be released sequentially, starting with Harry Potter and the Philosopher’s Stone, with a full cast of yet-to-be-named actors and a ‘groundbreaking new soundscape’New audiobooks of all seven titles in JK Rowling’s Harry Potter series will be released exclusively on Audible in late... Continue reading at The Guardian
[ The Guardian | 2024-04-25 16:37:29 UTC ]
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Gloucester-based bookseller bought by the retail giant in 2011 will shut at the end of AprilThe online shop Book Depository is due to close at the end of April, vendors and publishing partners have been told. This comes after the bookseller’s parent company Amazon announced it had decided to... Continue reading at The Guardian
[ The Guardian | 2023-04-04 11:07:43 UTC ]
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The retail giant will shut its bookstore in San Jose and Walnut Creek, as well as it its 4-star stores in Burlingame, Berkeley and Corte Madera as part of a company-wide brick-and-mortar reset. Continue reading at Silicon Valley Business Journal
[ Silicon Valley Business Journal | 2022-03-02 23:22:50 UTC ]
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You no longer have to wonder just what Netflix's adaptation of Sandman will look like. Netflix has shared a teaser for The Sandman that reveals the pivotal moment when an occult ritual captures Morpheus (aka Dream, played by Tom Sturridge) and sets the story in motion. As author Neil Gaiman put... Continue reading at Engadget
[ Engadget | 2021-09-25 17:30:41 UTC ]
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Class action lawsuit filed in US claims the houses have colluded with the online giant to keep prices artificially highAmazon.com and the “Big Five” publishers – Penguin Random House, Hachette, HarperCollins, Macmillan and Simon & Schuster – have been accused of colluding to fix ebook... Continue reading at The Guardian
[ The Guardian | 2021-01-15 13:04:33 UTC ]
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European Union regulators have brought anti-trust charges against Amazon, accusing the retail giant of using sensitive data from the third-party sellers who use its marketplace to gain unfair advantage for its own retail business. Continue reading at The Bookseller
[ The Bookseller | 2020-11-10 15:04:25 UTC ]
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Stephen Fry, Ben Bailey Smith and Helena Bonham Carter are to narrate the audio edition of The Book of Hopes: Words and Pictures to Comfort, Inspire and Entertain (Bloomsbury), edited by Katherine Rundell. Continue reading at The Bookseller
[ The Bookseller | 2020-10-29 19:07:20 UTC ]
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In this David-versus-Goliath battle, mom-and-pop bookstores wrapped themselves in Amazon's familiar brown cardboard as a protest against the retail giant and a plea to shop local. The Instagram-ready stunt, with Amazon lookalike boxes covered in sick literary burns and topical quips, came... Continue reading at AdWeek
[ AdWeek | 2020-10-19 20:06:41 UTC ]
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Third-party sellers selling "new condition" books will be able to bid for Amazon's buy button in the UK from January 2021, the retail giant has confirmed. Continue reading at The Bookseller
[ The Bookseller | 2020-08-26 16:41:34 UTC ]
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As the Hay Festival gets under way in Abu Dhabi, Stephen Fry and Noam Chomsky have signed an open letter calling on the UAE authorities to release imprisoned writers and demonstrate their commitment to free speech. Continue reading at The Bookseller
[ The Bookseller | 2020-02-25 05:08:26 UTC ]
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Waterstones boss James Daunt has warned the Scottish book industry against the growing dominance of Amazon, saying that if the retail giant ever implemented print book subscriptions it would make working in the books business “frankly intolerable”. Continue reading at The Bookseller
[ The Bookseller | 2019-02-27 00:00:00 UTC ]
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Retailer insists Authors Guild report that criticised the online giant for contributing to tumbling writers’ incomes used flawed figures, but Guild stands by findingsAmazon has called the conclusions of a recent report into US author earnings flawed, after the Authors Guild suggested that the... Continue reading at The Guardian
[ The Guardian | 2019-01-16 00:00:00 UTC ]
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Edtech startup KalamTech has created an app series about great thinkers from history, voiced by Stephen Fry. Continue reading at The Bookseller
[ The Bookseller | 2018-12-13 00:00:00 UTC ]
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Sales have doubled in the past five years, with commuters and men aged 25 to 44 accounting for the bulk of purchases. But many of us are unable to finish them – so here are a few you won’t give up onNo longer just the greatest invention for bathtub readers, the audiobook is, according to new... Continue reading at The Guardian
[ The Guardian | 2018-04-09 00:00:00 UTC ]
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Amazon may have spent the past two decades pulling bookstore shoppers to its business online, but with a new storefront in California's East Bay, the retail giant is hoping to lure them back to a brick-and-mortar store. Amazon Books is in the final stages of preparing for its opening tomorrow... Continue reading at Silicon Valley Business Journal
[ Silicon Valley Business Journal | 2017-11-02 00:00:00 UTC ]
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In their new book, Biblical scholars Candida Moss and Joel Baden examine the Green family’s collection of antiquities planned for their $500 million Museum of the Bible, and question how the Hobby Lobby owners might be able to control the conversation about the Bible through it. Continue reading at Publishers Weekly
[ Publishers Weekly | 2017-09-25 00:00:00 UTC ]
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Hay Festival's first weekend has kicked off with a host of events featuring writers including Colm Tóibín, Helen Fielding and Stephen Fry who discussed issues such as using flashbacks in writing, criticisms of anti-feminism and "aggregating news agencies" such as Facebook. Continue reading at The Bookseller
[ The Bookseller | 2017-05-31 00:00:00 UTC ]
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J K Rowling’s original Harry Potter septet, vocalised by Stephen Fry, dominated the audio download chart in 2016, but their magic fell short of displacing Paula Hawkins’ pre-eminent psychological thriller. Continue reading at The Bookseller
[ The Bookseller | 2017-01-30 00:00:00 UTC ]
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Marking the first collaboration between a book publisher and Amazon Alexa, HarperCollins Christian Publishing is launching a devotionals skill for retail giant’s “intelligent assistant” starting December 12. Continue reading at Publishers Weekly
[ Publishers Weekly | 2016-12-12 00:00:00 UTC ]
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