Code Meet Print TO is the new booky, geeky, beery event series from BookNet Canada which I organize. The plan for CMPTO was simple: get book industry experts and tech experts together in one room so they can meet each other, share ideas, and have a few drinks.
A Lesson on Metadata
Yesterday I took the second of four metadata BISG webinars. It featured our Bibliographic Manager (or, as I like to call him, our Data Czar), Tom Richardson, along side Richard Stark, Director of Product Data at Barnes & Noble.
This webinar went over the 31 key data elements in ONIX, what they mean and why you should fill them out.
Canadian Bookshelf, eh?
If you haven’t already visited, Canadian Bookshelf, I would highly recommend you take a little time to do so. The site itself looks great and there is a plethora of great (Canadian) content already there with more to come. I won’t go into all the features and functions of the site here as you can just go and try it out or read about it on their blog, but I will point out why we like this project in one word: collaboration.
Book Expo America Roundup
BookNet Canada was at Book Expo America last week. Noah and I were both in NYC to attend. I was mainly there to go to the IDPF Digital Book conference, but I managed to find some time to wander the floor as well. Here’s a roundup of interesting tech-related products and presentations I saw while I was there.
It's the Little Things: CataList Details
We have been busy with CataList lately. Yes, we’ve been signing up publishers and booksellers on the system and helping them get started. We’ve had several online demos. But what people don’t realize is that we’re also continuing to work on CataList itself. We’re adding new features to it all the time in response to user feedback. It’s the little things that make a difference with a product like this, and we wanted to show you three of the ones that have been most useful so far.
Regional Differences
I’m going to let you in on a little secret: BookNet Canada can produce regional bestseller lists in BNC SalesData. Yep. We could tell you what the top 10 nonfiction books are in British Columbia and they may not match up to Ontario’s top 10.
We currently only produce bestseller lists for the Canadian market as a whole. But with this new capability, things get a little more interesting. What will we find?
Code Meet Print TO: A New "Booky Geeky Beery" Event Series from BNC
At BookNet Canada, we’ve found that there’s a gap between the tech community and the book industry: Publishers have difficulty finding the right developers to work with, and developers who are interested in book-related projects don’t know how to meet book industry experts. So, we thought we’d help fill that gap.
They're Always After Me Red Lemonade!
Richard Nash needs no introduction but if he does you can do no better than to tune into the talk he gave at the 2010 BookNet Technology Forum. Nash has been re-imagining the business of publishing for some time and, in fact, left his post at Soft Skull to begin building that re-imagining.
Red Lemonade, his new project, is all about connecting readers and writers and has that social community goodness baked right in. There are no walled gardens here.
Does this on its own reinvent publishing?
Going Mobile
A recent New York Times article pointed to the need for retailers to retool their sites for mobile shopping. There is an opportunity here for book retailers too, if not exactly to lead the way, then at least not to lag too far behind. It would seem like there is no time like the present to get your e-commerce site optimized for the mobile space. It isn’t really rocket science. Here are a few things you may want to consider when thinking about this…
B&N's Nook Color Officially Becomes an Android Tablet
This week, Barnes & Noble has pushed a software update (version 1.2.0) that officially takes the Nook Color from e-reader to tablet. Why officially? Well, Nook owners have been turning the device into a tablet on their own for months already.
