The barriers to becoming a published author were broken down a little further Monday as a traditional book publishing giant invested in an online publishing services provider.
Random House Ventures, a division of New York-based book publishing giant Random House Inc., announced it has taken a significant minority stake in Xlibris.com. Terms of the deal were not disclosed.
Philadelphia-based Xlibris, which currently offers services for authors to publish e-books, hardcovers, and trade paperbacks, also announced plans for an author-centric website. The site will provide writers with member home pages, chat rooms, forums, message boards, and writers' workshops. It will also help writers find freelance editors and extensive design services.
Xlibris also said it will offer its services for free and with no restrictions on exclusivity of rights.
"Because of this investment, we will now be able to take care of authors at a level that no one ever dreamed of before," said John Feldcamp, CEO of Xlibris.com.
Random House officials said they will not be mining the offerings at Xlibris for undiscovered writers. And Xlibris will continue to work with other publishers.
"We are currently in talks with several major traditional publishing houses. When we have a special book we are going to get it to the right people. That’s something we owe our authors," said Feldcamp.
Book industry estimates claim that half a million books will reach the market in 2001. Online marketers, authors, and publishing companies are now looking for new ways to introduce those books to the reading public.
The Internet book explosion is fueling some of the growth. There are now books available in every format, written by every kind of writer, covering every topic.
Random House's stake in Xlibris is yet another step in the book industry's search for a solution to returns and warehousing costs. There has never been a way to successfully estimate how many copies of a title will sell, so publishers are forced to estimate the demand. If sales fall short, store owners return the unsold titles, which the publishing house then remainders at a loss. Electronic solutions will eliminate some of those issues.
"Digitizing is part of the future," said Stuart Applebaum, senior vice president at Random House, which is currently digitizing 20,000 of their titles.
Random House is not alone in embracing new technology. In addition to Simon & Schuster's first -- but not last -- foray into e-books with Stephen King's Riding the Bullet, other publishers are also embracing the new technology.
Last week, St. Martin's Press announced that it would be offering e-versions of many of its paper titles. In an interview with Publisher's Weekly, Steve Cohen, senior vice president of finance and administration at St. Martin's said, "Eventually, every SMP title will be released simultaneously in print and in digital form."
However, some question whether flooding the market is good for readers.
"All these new books appearing on the market is great," said Carol Fitzgerald, president and CEO of The Book Report Network, which develops reader-centric interactive magazine content for seven online sites. "But how on earth are we going to start weeding through them and figuring out which deserve to get our attention?"
According to Nora Rawlinson, editor in chief of Publisher's Weekly, that magazine receives approximately 70,000 review copies a year. It employs over 600 reviewers and still only reviews about 10 percent of what it receives.
"Right now we all know something about each book and its author, which at least gets us to start thinking about which to review and helps us make informed discussions," said Fitzgerald. But she is seriously concerned that deals like the one announced between Xlibris and Random House will flood the market and in the end do a major disservice to readers.
"What's going on in the publishing industry with e-books and print-on-demand books is a great thing for authors. But the readers are going to end up losing, because like us, they are going to be overwhelmed by all the hundreds of thousands of titles out there."
