HarperCollins UK: Bringing the Social to a Book Near You
Updated X3
The bookseller.com has posted the complete text of a speech given by Victoria Barnsley, chief executive of HarperCollins UK, entitled “Media’s last diehard?” I am posting this in a hurry today so what follows is my reaction in brief.
Barnsley offers some tantalizing info on the Bookarmy.com project (a link to the beta), “the secret weapon, in BookArmy’s arsenal, is a sophisticated algorithm, which generates book recommendations, based on feedback from other readers about their likes and dislikes.” This is starting to sound like a project I can get behind — part Netflix, part IMDB part Publishers Marketplace. Great ingredients. It is coming in January.
Barnsley outlined an initiative to create an annotated version of The Golden Notebook in conjunction with Institute of the Future of the Book. This is really cool.
This project is a purely marketing exercise aimed at increasing the continued relevance of Doris’s work to new generations but it also illustrates the kind of value, that can be added, by a publisher, to the experience of consuming a text.
Barnsley also talked about the authonomy.com project. I have yet to check out the Golden Notebook initiative or authonomy.com but I am looking forward to doing a deeper dive.
Barnsley also tripped my cynical radar a couple of times with her comments.
She said “I’m not as worried as some by risk of disintermediation. A publisher’s job is complex….” And a music label executive’s job isn’t?
She said “authonomy [puts] us at the centre of a hub of interactivity, between readers and would-be writers….” Meaning the writers on authonony aren’t really writers until they are published by you?
And it is a wee pretentious to have “a number of writers and academics” first, then readers second, annotate the Golden Notebook. She obviously didn’t read Here Comes Everybody. Not to mention the publisher’s true value-add in that example is really pretty minimal.
But those are just small gripes. Barnsley’s message that publishers have to change is well received. And I am glad to see an executive at Harper Collins saying these things. I was worried with Jane Friedman gone and their profit down, they would have their heads in the sand. Instead they are challenging Penguin UK for the industry leader.
update – http://thegoldennotebook.org
I heart Laura Kipnis.
update2 —
A Great Roundup of Victoria Barnsley’ speech by James Bridle at Times Emit Apt Studio
Reaction from So Misguided and Beyond Hall8
update3 — The Digitalist
1 Comment