We note that over one million iPhone 3GS units were sold in just its first three days and take a quick look at iPhone world..
Three Book App Moments
OUP has made 11 of its reference dictionaries available for the first time on the iPhone and iTouch Apps at £8.99 each. They are searchable, have unlimited bookmarking and you can email the definitions to friends.
The available titles are: Oxford Dictionary of Accounting; Oxford Dictionary of Biology; Oxford Dictionary of Business & Management; Oxford Dictionary of Chemistry; Oxford Dictionary of Computing; Oxford Dictionary of Finance & Banking; Oxford Dictionary of Law; Oxford Concise Medical Dictionary; Oxford Dictionary of Music; Oxford Dictionary of Philosophy; Oxford Dictionary of Politics.
In another launch IDW Publishing is a new line of digital comic apps allowing fans to download comics directly to their iPhone or iPod Touch. The 12 new movie-related digital comics are a must-read for all TRANSFORMERS fan, setting the stage for the upcoming TRANSFORMERS: REVENGE OF THE FALLEN film. The iPhone comics are supported with a custom landing page on the iTunes store and feature panel-by-panel viewing, easy to use controls, such as “swipe” navigation, and a convenient table of contents function. These come on the back the 40 digital comics, such as Star Trek: Countdown that IDW have already created.
After reference and comics we also note that The Audiobooks app has captured the number one Apple's free App spot for the books category. The app introduces a catalogue of 1,800 free audiobooks to iPhone and iPod Touch users and potentially offering a audiobook long overdue moment.
The catalogue of nearly 10,000 hours of listening is to be applauded as it uses recordings from the LibriVox Project, which is a collection of volunteer-read audio books from the public domain.
Market News
Meanwhile anyone who doubted that Apple had created the winner of the smartphone pack need to look no further than the news that a survey, by market research firm Crowd Science, found that 40% smartphone users who don't have an iPhone want one next time round and 80% upgrade to the next Apple device next time. Interestingly only 14% of non-BlackBerry users would switch to a BlackBerry device for their next mobile phone. According to Gartner Apple has doubled its share of the worldwide smartphone market in the first quarter to 10.8% from 5.3% a year ago. Another interest note from the Crowd Science study was that 71% of smartphone subscribers use them for both personal and business purposes, with only 3% using them just for business.
The Downside
One downside appears the news that all the exclusive carriers appear to wantto charge for tethering, or being able to use the iPhone as a mobile modem for the laptop. Some say its hard or almost impossible for them to detect and others point users to simple way to break it via benm.at. Tethering is an obvious benefit to mobile people and was made available as part of OS 3.0 so it seems harsh that the carriers are using to raise revenues and create a barrier to buy when it would be a major plus if it was free within the unlimited Internet access plans.
The other downside appears to be the news that the Interim Federal Communications Commission chair Michael Copps is calling for an examination of exclusive handset deals to establish if they are restricting innovation. US Senator Kerry wrote to the FCC suggesting that such deals risk giving too much power to dominant networks, with particular reference to the iPhone and AT&T.
Showing posts with label OUP. Show all posts
Showing posts with label OUP. Show all posts
Tuesday, June 23, 2009
Tuesday, February 19, 2008
Marrying Content to Platform
We read this week of Dorling Kindersley’s agreement with media content company Mobifusion to globally deliver branded mobile content to consumers. Earlier this year a similar deal was struck with Encyclopaedia Britannica for their Concise 2008 encyclopaedia and in Decemeber another deal with Oxford University Press was sealed to create and deliver mobile editions of Oxford's dictionaries to mobile phones and devices through key wireless operators and other sales channels.
If we forget the service what this indicates is that the reference publishers are starting to see the potential of porting their materials on to the mobile platform. Many believed that this was the domain that the ebok reader woulds secure but it makes just as much sense for this world of quick search and retrieval to go straight to the mobile. After all you need look no further than the market acceptance of the Blackberry and mobile emails and graphical capabilities of the iPhone to see that an ereader would just be a clunky device.
As we said before all we need is a iPhone and an Airbook all the rest are mere pretenders.
If we forget the service what this indicates is that the reference publishers are starting to see the potential of porting their materials on to the mobile platform. Many believed that this was the domain that the ebok reader woulds secure but it makes just as much sense for this world of quick search and retrieval to go straight to the mobile. After all you need look no further than the market acceptance of the Blackberry and mobile emails and graphical capabilities of the iPhone to see that an ereader would just be a clunky device.
As we said before all we need is a iPhone and an Airbook all the rest are mere pretenders.
Sunday, September 16, 2007
Digitisation Does Not Start at the Back Door
The question of what to do in the digital world and when to do it perplexes many today. Different sectors are clearly moving at different speeds and in different directions and the questions are still very focused on the consumer demand and that all elusive ebook reader.
Last week Elsevier and Oxford University Press launched major programmes to migrate e-book versions of front and backlist print titles onto their digital platforms. Elsevier made 4,000 backlist e-books available on its online journals site Science-Direct and aim to put another 4,000 backlist titles plus some 700 new titles onto the platform in 2008. OUP plan to publish 200 academic monographs in parallel with the print versions on its subscription-only site, Oxford Scholarship Online.
These moves may appear small but they are part of a growing migration that is becoming stand in the academic world. This sector realise, that the current demand from intuitions is for online ‘stuff’ and if they don’t move, it clearly places them at a growing disadvantage. Leaders such as Taylor and Francis are clearly making and benefiting from the digital transition today. Academic publishers are aware of the threats and opportunities from new entrants.
However as we have long agued, publishers need to change their upstream processes, and to digitalise these so that they have titles which they can quickly deploy in any which way. This change is starting to take place and again academic, reference and educational publishers are leading they way. Customised books are become a reality and digitisation is starting to replace the old analogue process. Online libraries are also become common and many are starting to look at books, chapters, articles and think outside the jacket.
Publishers should be less obsessed by the end product being digital and more focused at digitising the process from manuscript to finished product. This is where the benefit case is strongest, the asset development has its greatest opportunity to maximise its value and where market change can be kick-started. Converting backlist isn’t going to be economic unless the sell, digitising typesetting is a start but its at the finished product stage and often misses out on the digital promotion and marketing opportunities. Lets not forget rights, which in the true digital world should be tagged to every digital asset and track able but in today’s world are often sitting in a separate transactional database and lost in space and after all publishing is a rights business.
Last week Elsevier and Oxford University Press launched major programmes to migrate e-book versions of front and backlist print titles onto their digital platforms. Elsevier made 4,000 backlist e-books available on its online journals site Science-Direct and aim to put another 4,000 backlist titles plus some 700 new titles onto the platform in 2008. OUP plan to publish 200 academic monographs in parallel with the print versions on its subscription-only site, Oxford Scholarship Online.
These moves may appear small but they are part of a growing migration that is becoming stand in the academic world. This sector realise, that the current demand from intuitions is for online ‘stuff’ and if they don’t move, it clearly places them at a growing disadvantage. Leaders such as Taylor and Francis are clearly making and benefiting from the digital transition today. Academic publishers are aware of the threats and opportunities from new entrants.
However as we have long agued, publishers need to change their upstream processes, and to digitalise these so that they have titles which they can quickly deploy in any which way. This change is starting to take place and again academic, reference and educational publishers are leading they way. Customised books are become a reality and digitisation is starting to replace the old analogue process. Online libraries are also become common and many are starting to look at books, chapters, articles and think outside the jacket.
Publishers should be less obsessed by the end product being digital and more focused at digitising the process from manuscript to finished product. This is where the benefit case is strongest, the asset development has its greatest opportunity to maximise its value and where market change can be kick-started. Converting backlist isn’t going to be economic unless the sell, digitising typesetting is a start but its at the finished product stage and often misses out on the digital promotion and marketing opportunities. Lets not forget rights, which in the true digital world should be tagged to every digital asset and track able but in today’s world are often sitting in a separate transactional database and lost in space and after all publishing is a rights business.
Sunday, August 05, 2007
Cheaper Journals?
Cheaper journals? I had to read the article again as I must be dreaming. It was like listening to Gordon Brown giving us all a tax cut – there has to be a catch, after all we had nothing like this before and to the contrary only heard about journal price increases for many years.
Oxford University Press is reported to be lowering prices on its range of 28 journals in its "hybrid" Open Access (OA) scheme by an average of 5%.
Major journal publishers have all launched hybrid open access schemes which enables authors to pay for their articles published in traditionally non-OA journals to be made freely available. The successes of the schemes are dependant on authors signing up and adopting the new model. Once sufficient sign up is achieved then the costs reduce and the price can come down – simple commerce.
However, it is reported that Elsevier and CUP have only got 1% of authors to agree to make articles Open Access in their hybrid journals and it appears still early days. One swallow doesn’t make a summer but we may be witnessing a change in the commercial model and relationships in this highly lucrative and important marketplace.
Oxford University Press is reported to be lowering prices on its range of 28 journals in its "hybrid" Open Access (OA) scheme by an average of 5%.
Major journal publishers have all launched hybrid open access schemes which enables authors to pay for their articles published in traditionally non-OA journals to be made freely available. The successes of the schemes are dependant on authors signing up and adopting the new model. Once sufficient sign up is achieved then the costs reduce and the price can come down – simple commerce.
However, it is reported that Elsevier and CUP have only got 1% of authors to agree to make articles Open Access in their hybrid journals and it appears still early days. One swallow doesn’t make a summer but we may be witnessing a change in the commercial model and relationships in this highly lucrative and important marketplace.
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