Can the first ten pages of a book and crowdsourcing become the next model of publishing?

Springwise is always a good source of innovative ideas and last week I've learned there about a very new innovative model of publishing, using a crowdsourcing strategy and based on ten pages.

Yes, just the first ten pages of the book are required according to the new website called Tenpages.com to determine whether it's worth publishing or not. And who will decide? the readers. But unlike similar ventures, like WEbook, here the readers don't vote only with their mouse, but also with their wallets.

So how does it work? Here's the description of the process from Springwise:

Aspiring writers register for free on TenPages and post the first 10 pages or more of their book. Those pages then become viewable to the site's prospective shareholders, who can buy up to 200 shares in any book for EUR 5 each; a widget is available to help them promote their favourites among their own social networks. The books that sell 2,000 shares during the four months they remain active on the site—garnering EUR 10,000—get put into production at one of TenPages' partner publishers, which include Pearson, The Workers Press and The House of Books. Authors get paid EUR 1,000 from the initial funds raised, while the remainder is held over for publishing and promoting the final book. The author then has eight months to write the tome with the help of a professional editor.

Tenpages.com is collaborating with three publishers to make it work: De Arbeiderspers, The House of Books and Pearson.

Will it work? will it become a new popular model of publishing? I guess that this model has couple of advantages that makes it attractive both for publishers and readers (publishers reduce their risk and readers have a chance to profit money and prestige, as their name ppear in the back of the published books they helped discover), but it has a chance to become a real alternative model only when we'll see couple of success stories or bestsellers that came out of it.

You're welcome to check out their website, but it's only in Dutch, so might need the services of Google translate to dive in.

Yours,
Raz @ Eco-Libris

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Free (and green) alternative for book lovers at three European airports

Have you ever planned to pack a book for a flight, but forgot it in the last minute? And what happens if you're in a mood for reading at the airport but you already finished the one you brought with you?

A new initiative of Oneworld alliance, which is both free and green, provides you with a solution! Springwise reports that starting this month, travellers passing through Brussels, Milan Malpensa and Rome Fiumicino airports can download three audiobooks for free.

The process is very simple -when you travel through one of these three airports, simply log on to the airport wifi signal and enter the following URL (free access): http://library.oneworld.com.

Then you can download audiobooks to your laptop, smartphones or PDA—any device that connects to the airports' wifi networks. You can pick from forty titles, covering fiction, business, society and travel; available in English, Dutch, French and Italian.

This is a great initiative, as it provides customers with a valued service at no charge and it's also eco-friendly as these are audio books, which is one of the greenest forms of books, especially when you're using your laptop for that matter.

You can of course argue that if you have Kindle or any other eBook reader device it will give you a much better solution. BUT firstly not everyone have it as it's still expensive, second not everyone like to read from an eBook device reader and last but not least, it might not be such an eco-friendly solution as we don't know yet if eBooks readers are better for the environment (you can find more about it at http://www.ecolibris.net/ebooks.asp)

One more kudos to Oneworld, a global alliance that brings together ten of the world's biggest and best airlines - all travellers, whether Oneworld customers or not, can use this service.

Yours,
Raz @ Eco-Libris
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Reading books chapter by chapter

I read few days ago in Springwise (a great source to new interesting ideas) about a new initiative of Random House: Selling books by the chapter.

Random House explains the logic behind the new initiative: "Sometimes what you want is a slice instead of the whole pie. That's why we're offering a new reading experience-- the ability to purchase individual chapters. Imagine that! Downloading and reading exactly the part of a book that meets your needs".

The first book to be offered by them is 'Made to Stick', written by Chip Heath and Dan Heath. This book actually looks like a very interesting book. Here's the book description on its website:

Why do some ideas thrive while others die? And how do we improve the chances of worthy ideas? In Made to Stick, accomplished educators and idea collectors Chip and Dan Heath tackle head-on these vexing questions. Inside, the brothers Heath reveal the anatomy of ideas that “stick” and explain sure-fire methods for making ideas stickier, such as violating schemas, using the Velcro Theory of Memory, and creating “curiosity gaps.”

The process is very simple - on the book's website you can find a short description of each one of the six chapters of the book and its epilogue. You can choose the chapter that's right for you and download it as an Adobe Digital Editions file for $2.99. The introduction and index are available for free with the purchase of any chapter.

If you want to purchase the paper version of the book, you can still do it for $24.95 (or the audio CD for $29.95).

I like this idea as it generates more incentives for customers to download the book (or the chapters they are interested at in this case) instead of buying the paper version.

As Springwise writes, this idea won't work for every book, as most books you want to read from page one to the last page, but it can definitely work for guide books, such as 'Made to Stick'.

Random House is already involved for almost two years in a green initiative that is aimed to increase its usage of recycled paper to 30% by 2010. I'm not sure if Random House had the goal of reducing the usage of virgin paper when they came up with their chapters initiative, but it's definitely goes a welcomed by product.

Now we should only see if this initiative will really work. I guess other publishers will wait as well before jumping into the water with similar initiatives. We'll keep you posted as always.

Yours,
Raz @ Eco-Libris

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DailyLit - books in small portions for busy people

Springwise is always the right place to read on new trends and interesting websites. Last week I read there about a new solution for busy people who also love reading - DailyLit.

The goal of DailyLit, which was created last May, is to provide busy people books in small portions every day or so by email. The creators of DailyLit explain on the website what's the logic behind it: "We created DailyLit because we spent hours each day on email but could not find the time to read a book. Now the books come to us by email. Problem solved."

The process is very simple - you select a book, provide an email address, schedule at what time you want the emails sent to you (e.g. every weekday at 8:00 AM) and that's it. DailyLit will email you a small chunk of the book (about 5 minutes of reading) on the chosen schedule. DailyLit can be read any place that a reader receives emails, including on a PDA, Blackberry, Trio, etc.

If at the end of your daily chunk, you feel an uncontrolled desire to continue reading, there's no problem at all - DailyLit will send you the next installment right away.

It is also a free service for over 400 classic public domain titles, which are offered by DailyLit at no cost. Other titles will cost you between $5 to $10 (Skinny Bitch by Rory Freedman and Kim Barnouin will cost you for example$4.95).

I like the creative concept and the fact that DailyLit tries to find new ways to integrate books back into the lives of busy people, who may have difficulties to find the time to read. This way, it becomes a part of your daily routine, like drinking coffee in the morning or taking the dog out for a walk. And of course, it's a very green concept, as no paper is being involved in the process!

I decided to try it by myself and so I registered and picked a book I loved when I was a kid and I want to read again - "Three Men in a Boat" by Jerome K. (Jerome Klapka) Jerome. Tomorrow, at 6:40PM (my time for some rest..), I'll get the first installment and I'm really looking forward to reading it! You're welcome to check it as well.

Yours,
Raz @ Eco-Libris

Eco-Libris: plant a tree for every book you read!