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Self-Publishing | With ALLi | News Analysis & | Commentary | Proudly | Sponsored By | Bookvault | Miblart | Dan Holloway |…

New Speakies Awards Spotlight Indie Audiobooks; Spotify Reports Double-Digit Growth: Self-Publishing with ALLi Featuring Dan Holloway

On this episode of the Self-Publishing News Podcast, Dan Holloway reports that audiobook growth continues across major English-language markets, with Spotify claiming a 30 percent rise in listeners and a 36 percent increase in listening hours year over year. Dan also explores Spotify’s evolving role in the audiobook industry, the launch of the new UK-based Speakies Awards open to indie authors, and a troubling trend reported by the Wall Street Journal—AI-generated search summaries may be reducing ad revenue by diverting clicks away from content creators.
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Alliance Of Independent Authors | Self-Publishing News June 19, 2025 | With Dan Holloway

Spotify Reports Audiobook Growth; AI Search Summaries Cut Publisher Traffic: Self-Publishing News with Dan Holloway

Spotify is doing well and helping publishers in the process—or so says the latest release from, er, Spotify. Despite the obvious possible messiah complex going on, there are some really interesting and encouraging figures in the report. The catalog of English-language audiobooks now exceeds 400,000, which shows the scale of the operation.
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Alliance Of Independent Authors | Self-Publishing News June 17, 2025 | With Dan Holloway

New UK-Based Speakies Awards Offer Audiobook Alternative to the Audies: Self-Publishing News with Dan Holloway

As we celebrate the return of double-digit growth to audiobooks, it might seem strange that there is still really only one big audiobook award. The Audies, run by the Audio Publishers Association, is a huge affair with nearly thirty categories. And of course, it’s open to indie authors. Well, now there’s another contender: the Speakies (surely to become known as the Speakeasies—and if there’s not a Bugsy Malone feel to the first staging, I will be hugely disappointed).
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Alliance Of Independent Authors | Self-Publishing News June 14, 2025 | With Dan Holloway

Unbound Struggles Continue, UK Rejects AI Transparency, and PWC Tracks Job Shifts: Self-Publishing News with Dan Holloway

The ongoing Unbound struggles continue to unfold as more troubling news emerges about the transition from Unbound to Boundless Books. Having made it AI-free through the first half of the week, we end with a round-up of a few stories from the area. First (with a tangential AI link I hadn’t previously spotted), and with thanks to all-round legend Sam Missingham for this highly thoughtful thread on Bluesky, is the latest development in the Unbound/Boundless saga.
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Self-Publishing | With ALLi | News Analysis & | Commentary | Proudly | Sponsored By | Bookvault | Miblart | Dan Holloway |…

Double-Digit Audiobook Growth Returns; Dark Genres Rise; Publishers Embrace Direct Sales: Self-Publishing with ALLi Featuring Dan Holloway

On this episode of the Self-Publishing News Podcast, Dan Holloway reports a return to double-digit audiobook growth in the U.S., with revenue up 13 percent and over half of Americans now having listened to an audiobook. He also breaks down new data showing a shift in reader tastes toward darker genres—especially psychological thrillers and dark romance—and reflects on how traditional publishers are just now catching on to the power of direct sales and loyal fan bases, something indie authors have long embraced.
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Alliance Of Independent Authors | Self-Publishing News | June 7, 2025 | With Dan Holloway

Audiobook Sales Climb Back to Double-Digit Growth, Topping $2.22 Billion: Self-Publishing News with Dan Holloway

Remember those heady days when I reported on double-digit audiobook sales growth for a decade straight? Well, it seems that we have, however temporarily, returned to that time. The Audio Publishers Association has just launched its annual Sales Survey (by Toluna) and Consumer Survey (by Edison), and the results suggest that the audiobook industry is, at least on the surface, in a healthy state.
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Self-Publishing | With ALLi | News Analysis & Commentary | Proudly Sponsored By | Bookvault | Miblart | Dan Holloway | Sel…

AI Recreates Agatha Christie; Nearly Half of Authors Use AI; eBook Lending Debate Returns: Self-Publishing with ALLi featuring Dan Holloway

On this episode of the Self-Publishing News Podcast, Dan Holloway reports on a BBC Maestro course using AI to recreate Agatha Christie, a Nordic platform’s AI book-recommendation chatbot, and a BookBub survey showing nearly half of authors now use AI. He also covers renewed tension over library eBook lending after Penguin Random House pulled comics from a school platform.
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Alliance Of Independent | Authors | Self-Publishing | News | May 31, 2025 | With Dan Holloway

BookBub Survey Finds Indie Authors Divided on AI Use, Ethics Still a Major Concern: Self-Publishing News with Dan Holloway

Surveys are always great reading. They have more or less value in terms of understanding the challenging landscape, largely depending on their sample size and the transparency around it. This week we have a survey that’s both interesting and enlightening—and on the becoming-perennial subject of authors’ attitudes toward AI. It comes courtesy of a BookBub survey. This means that the kind of authors represented will be very like a sizeable portion of the cohort of indie authors. Indeed, 69 percent of authors who responded to the survey only self-publish, and 25 percent were hybrid.
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