New ‘dating app’ for books James Padolsey, founder of book recommendation service A Book Like Foo, has launched Love Your Shelf (loveyourshelf.net), a book “dating app”. Padolsey said: “Bookshelves have become a staple feature of lockdown, both in the backdrop of our video calls and as a place of comfort and joy when the world…
Amazon to receive £3.2m tax rebate after business rates appeal Amazon is set to receive a multi-million pound tax rebate following a legal row over business rates at its Rugeley warehouse in Staffordshire. The online retailer will receive a refund of around £3.2m as a result of changes to the rateable value of the warehouse…
Bound books will not be included in US tariffs, admits PA The United States tariffs on EU exports will not include bound books, the Publishers Association has admitted, after originally branding the move “completely unacceptable”. On Friday, the UK PA said printed books from the EU were going to be targeted by US tariffs. It…
Bristol University to house historic copy of Lady Chatterley’s Lover Bristol University will house a copy of Lady Chatterley’s Lover that once belonged to Sir Laurence Byrne, the judge who presided over the landmark 1960 obscenity case, keeping the historic edition in the UK. In May, the government slapped an export ban on the book and English PEN…
Publishers sue Amazon’s Audible over speech-to-text feature Major US publishers have filed a lawsuit against Amazon’s audiobook company Audible in a row over a new speech-to-text feature which they say is a violation of copyright law. The lawsuit, filed by Association of American Publishers (AAP), was filed in response to recent public statements from Audible,…
China crackdown on maps sparks major production delays A new censorship crackdown in China has led to Beijing officals checking all books being printed in the country for maps, causing delays of up to eight weeks for production teams and derailing launches for books featuring any kind of map. Chinese censors have long taken a…
International sales ‘increasingly important in 2019’, predict publishers Publishers will increasingly look to international territories for growth this year in the face of a stable but flat domestic market, according to industry leaders giving The Bookseller their predictions for what 2019 holds for the trade. Yet paradoxically the terms of many international trading relationships are currently uncertain…
After almost 600 booksellers withdrew 3.5m books from the secondhand marketplace in support of countries dropped by the website, it apologises for a ‘bad decision’ An “extraordinary and unprecedented” global protest from antiquarian booksellers has forced the Amazon-owned secondhand marketplace AbeBooks to backtrack on its decision to pull out of several countries. AbeBooks had told…
The concept of ‘exhaustion of rights’ (from the blog post Amazon and Brexit fuel territoriality fears) is not something I am familiar with, and the following article, courtesy WIPR provides a helpful explanation: Brexit: changes ahead for exhaustion of rights If the UK leaves the EU without joining the European Economic Area, the principle of trademark…
Amazon’s new rating system for the book market is seeking to challenge the decades-long dominance of the New York Times bestseller status Will Amazon Charts challenge the New York Times bestsellers list? Photograph: Amazon Monday 22 May 2017 18.41 BSTLast modified on Monday 22 May 2017 22.49 BST For nine decades, the New York Times bestseller…