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AI Copyright

UK Publishers Push Back on AI Copyright; Academic Libraries Shift to Subscription Model: Self-Publishing News with Dan Holloway

Fittingly for a Saturday snack, there are several smaller pieces of news I want to round up. Here in the UK, the public consultation on AI copyright has just finished, and the Publishers Association’s Dan Conway has been vocal on what he thinks needs to happen. A quotation in The Times includes fighting talk such as, “The message to government is clear: the great copyright heist cannot go unchallenged…Big Tech needs to pay for the creative and research content they hoover up to train AI.”
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World Of Books

World of Books Expands in the US; The StoryGraph Gains Traction as a Goodreads Alternative: Self-Publishing News with Dan Holloway

Midweek sees a couple of interesting, if low-key, stories. Many readers were expressing concern over Amazon as we ended last week after the change of terms removed Kindle book USB transfers from computer to e-reader. I hope we shed light on the story here, and it does feel that some of the absolute panic I saw on social media may have been a little overstated. But still, as people think of alternatives to the Amazon ecosystem, World of Books is expanding, and other options are emerging.
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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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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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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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