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Mental Health Fiction Award

Spotify Launches Mental Health Fiction Award; Meta Halted AI Licensing Talks: Self-Publishing with ALLi Featuring Dan Holloway

On this episode of the Self-Publishing with ALLi podcast, Dan Holloway explores Spotify’s new $10,000 mental health fiction award, the fallout from the Paris AI Summit, and surprising revelations about Meta’s stalled AI licensing talks with publishers. He also looks at the latest Kindle policy change that limits how readers can back up their e-books, raising concerns about digital ownership.
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AI Summit In Paris

AI Summit in Paris Ends Without UK and US Support; Copyright Concerns Left Unresolved: Self-Publishing News with Dan Holloway

Remember I promised to have only one AI-related story this week. I hope you also remember I said it would be a stretch. And that’s because the AI Summit in Paris has now taken place. If you recall, a group of thirty-eight creative industry bodies, including the International Publishers Association, had come together to call for regulation around transparency and compensation in relation to copyright.
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Spotify Focuses On Audiobooks

Spotify Focuses on Audiobooks, Kindle Sales Surge: Self-Publishing with ALLi Featuring Dan Holloway

On this episode of the Self-Publishing with ALLi podcast, Dan Holloway discusses how Spotify focuses on audiobooks with new tools for authors and its first full year of profitability. Kindle device sales hit their highest levels in over a decade, suggesting a shift in e-book reading habits. Plus, London Book Fair is just a month away, with key sessions on accessibility, sustainability, and attracting new readers.
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Kindle Sales

Amazon Sees Record Kindle Sales; AI Art Auction Sparks Controversy; UK Appoints Ex-Amazon Exec as Antitrust Chief: Self-Publishing News with Dan Holloway

E-books are still doing very well, and Kindle sales have seen a surprising resurgence. That was one of the themes that emerged last year. You will remember Mark Williams gave us one of his timely reminders of how woefully short the official figures fall and the increase to KDP Select payments, which now top $600 million a year and then some. But how are people reading those e-books?
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Spotify Profit

Spotify Celebrates its First Full Year of Profit: Self-Publishing News with Dan Holloway

Spotify is excited. And it clearly thinks we should be excited, too. The company has been around for seventeen years (I am sure I have mentioned this before, but if you have even a passing interest in Spotify, the relationship between tech and the arts, or just cracking good television, you should check out the Netflix series The Playlist, which tells the story of Spotify’s early years using some clever narrative devices). And 2024 was its first full year of profitability.
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Bookshop.org Expands To E-Books

Bookshop.org Expands to E-Books; Authors Guild Launches Human Authored Certification: The Self-Publishing with ALLi Podcast Featuring Dan Holloway

On this episode of the Self-Publishing with ALLi podcast, Dan Holloway reports on Bookshop.org’s new support for ebooks, giving indie authors more ways to reach readers while supporting local bookstores. He also covers the U.S. Copyright Office’s latest report on AI and copyright, which outlines how current laws apply to AI-assisted works, and the Authors Guild’s new Human Authored certification, designed to provide transparency about AI-generated content in books.
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Simon & Schuster

Simon & Schuster Drops Blurbs, Encyclopaedia Britannica Eyes IPO, WH Smith Faces Uncertain Future: Self-Publishing News with Dan Holloway

The second round-up of the week has an interesting common thread. Each of the three stories represents the end of an era in some way. The first is more an item of amusing good riddance—an amuse-bouche in every sense. Simon & Schuster has announced that it won’t be pushing authors and editors to paste puff quotes on their covers.
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Human Authored

Authors Guild Launches Human Authored Certification; Copyright Office Releases AI Report: Self-Publishing News with Dan Holloway

You may have noticed that AI is back in the news in a big way, with new discussions about what it means to create "human authored" work. And while I am not, strictly speaking, writing a column about DeepSeek, the entry of another hugely competent and vastly hyped generative AI platform into the fray clearly has implications for us all—not least of which is the demonstration of the vulnerability of whole marketplaces to activities in a single tech sector. As if we needed reminding after the whole FTX debacle and many others before it.
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The Audies

Indie Authors Shine at The Audies; AI and Bookstore Events Make Waves: Self-Publishing News with Dan Holloway

The Audies, run by the Audio Publishing Association, are the industry’s most prestigious awards for audiobooks. And they are of particular interest to us because they have no barriers to entry for indie authors. Indeed, as I have reported over the years, we are sometimes nominated and have even been known to win (2021’s Heroine by Mary Jane Wells). If I had ever been so bold as to proclaim, “The indies are coming!” I would be frustrated at the slow progress over the past few years.
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