Simon and Schuster took an evolutionary leap into digital publishing yesterday with a newly-created online book called the Vook, which is short for video book. The concept was created by the company with the same name.
S&S debuted today with four titles. Atria, an imprint of S&S, commissioned thriller author Richard Doetsch and bestselling romance writer Jude Devereaux to write original novellas between 25,000 and 40,000 words specifically for this form. The nonfiction titles are Narine Nikogosian's Return to Beauty and the previously-released hardcover, Pete Cerqua's The 90-Second Fitness Solution.
Publisher's Lunch reported that the Vooks will be "priced at $6.99, the two fiction and two nonfiction titles are meant to represent a range of experimentation with the form, which embeds original video clips within a browser-based version of a digital book. (And the pricing represents a willingness by the partners to price to market and encourage adoption rather than be bound by print-pricing paradigms.)
"Titles will be sold through a dedicated section of S&S's web site and Vook's site, though the primary driver - and most natural iteration - is likely the iPhone Apps, with iPhone selling the launch titles at a promotional discount as well. They'll also have an affiliate widget available for bloggers and others to help drive sales." The four debut titles with iPhone app are available at the Vook site for $4.99 per title.
Atria's Judith Curr that sales of "anywhere between 4,000 and 400,000 units will be considered a success at this stage. The publisher expects to seed fan sites, bloggers and other sites widely with 'review' access (review copies are free, after all) and expects particularly enthusiastic adoption from Deveraux's deep and e-savvy fan base," according to the report in Publisher's Lunch.
This is certainly a bold move on S&S and we will know very shortly if it takes off or flops
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Comments
"form, which embeds original video clips within a browser-based version of a digital" text. Only!!!
This is a not a EBook! This is a not a Multimedia EBook!
revolutionary ebook - it is a Multimedia EBook. Try: www.eveda.org
This is not new. The EPPIE competition committee were discussing 4 or more years ago how to handle these sorts of multimedia books in the contest. It's yet another situation where NY tries to claim they invented something that has been around a long time. The format they use may be different that what has been used before, but sound and/or video in an e-book isn't a new concept. No offense intended to S&S.
Brenna
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