 |
December
1999
- Profit
Loss
- Taylor
& Francis buys med publisher
- Study:
Diversity undermines basic skills
- Bertelsmann
seeks professional, scientific growth
- Barnes
& Noble buys into vanity house
- Hosts,
SRA/McGraw in new alliance
- Coalition
seeks new representation talks with CCC
- Harvard
in spat over outside teaching
- Who
owns textbook royalties at Georgia?
- E-archive
would link research papers globally
- Harvard
professor halts selling lecture videos
- Librarians:
Scholarly journals pad content
- TAA
launches direct-sale site for authors
- IFRRO
chief steps down to return to Norway
- Elsevier:
Value-added j-articles can't be free
- Canadian
trust-busters OK Pearson divestiture
- Editor:
Molecular Structure meets reader needs
- TAA
members uged to submit to Teacher Channel
- Librarians
may cancel "padded" subscriptions
- TAA
newsletter features English author
- Exiting
Pearson author kept informed on sale
- TAA
E-List now has 25 titles
- McGraw-Hill
sees expansion overseas
- TAA
has upcoming board vacancies
- IFRRO
steps up development plans
- Piracy
case ends with two-year probation
- B&N
bows to Germany on Mein Kampf
- Pearson
creates 9,000-activity learning site
- Wiley
offers rosy financial report
- Zi
moving into China web market
- Hurry,
hurry, for Texty, McGuffey deadline
- Reed
gives up geographic structure to cut costs
- TAA
members send extra dollars, gifts too
- Profit
Loss
- Investment
firm adds Chelsea to stable
- McGraw-Hill
shedding non-ed, non-biz units
- Ideal's
j-database growing to 150,000 articles
- Teacher
Channel seeking course materials
- Financial
analysts expecting buyer for Reed
- Excellence
awards narrowed to 12 titles
- Engineering
titles bring TAA E-List to 28
- Authors
challenge sweet insider deals
- Study
examines scholarly communication channels
- Delaware
replacing print journals with e-database
- South-Western
leaves high-school markets
- TAA
awards short a few judges
- Wadsworth
shreds book after Islam complaint
- Reed
keeping Cahners, other components
- U.S.
copyright industry outpaces economic growth
- American-Islamic
Council watches for slights
- Top
Authoring News of 1999
PROFIT
LOSS
Advance
Learning:
Sales rose 52 percent to $23 million in the latest quarter.
Educational
Insights: Sales rose 21 percent to $39.2 million in the latest
year.
Primedia:
Sales grew 13.6 percent to $259.1 million in the latest three
quarters.
top
of page for all news
Taylor
& Francis buys med publisher
LONDON,
December 1, 1999
-- British medical publisher Martin Dunitz was acquired for US$50
million by Taylor & Francis. Dunitz has been publishing about
45 books a year.
top
of page for all news
Study:
Diversity undermines basic skills
BOSTON,
December 1, 1999
-- An emphasis on cultural diversity is cluttering reading textbooks
and confusing pupils, said Sandra Stotsky, deputy Massachusetts
education commissioner. Stotsky, who studied three generations
of textbooks, said valuable time and space are given to toleration
lessons in lieu of basic skills. The language to do so, she said,
puts pupils on confusing tangents into areas beyond their reading
skills. Her solution: Put off cultural diversity until students
master basic reading skills.
top
of page for all news
Bertelsmann
seeks professional, scientific growth
GÜTERSLOH,
Germany, December 1, 1999
-- The German media giant Bertelsmann is scouting for successful
scientific and professional publishing houses to strengthen its
Science+Business Media unit. Chief executive Juergen Richter said
acquisitions would be gradual, funded partly by a public stock
offering planned for 2001.
top
of page for all news
Barnes
& Noble buys into vanity house
CAMPBELL,
California, December 1, 1999
-- Forty-nine percent of Vanity publisher iUniverse.com was acquired
by Barnes & Noble. IUniverse had 600 titles on its 1998 list,
many of them put on-on-line for a flat $99 fee from the authors.
For $299 iUniverse gives a manuscript to an editorial board to
decide whether to market the book to stores.
top
of page for all news
Hosts,
SRA/McGraw in new alliance
DALLAS,
December 1, 1999
-- A company that provides a data base of curricular materials
for educators, Hosts Corporation, will list SRA/McGraw-Hill products.
Listed will be Open Court Reading, phonics and comprehension;
Leamos Espanol, K-3 Spanish; and Journeys, remedial
reading.
top
of page for all news
Coalition
seeks new representation talks with CCC
GROSSE
POINTE FARMS, Michigan, December 1, 1999
-- The Authors Coalition, a group of U.S. author organizations,
including Text and Academic Authors, formally proposed new dialogue
with the Copyright Clearance Center on author representation on
the CCC board. The CCC, which controls policy on repatriating
foreign copyright collections to U.S. rightsholders, has only
a minority of authors on its board of directors and those are
selected not by authors but by the publisher-dominated board itself.
top
of page for all news
Harvard
in spat over outside teaching
CAMBRIDGE,
Massachusetts, December 1, 1999
-- Administrators at the Harvard University law school are upset
that a professor, Arthur R. Miller, has sold videotapes of his
lectures to the on-line Concord law school. Harvard's law dean,
Robert C. Clark, claims that Harvard should be able to limit what
faculty provide to competing schools. The issue requires redefining
the rules on outside teaching, which have been blurred by distance
education, Clark said. Miller denied that he's teaching at Concord.
He has no interactivity with the Concord students who view his
tapes, much as a textbook author lacks interactivity with students,
Miller said.
top
of page for all news
Who owns
textbook royalties at Georgia?
ATLANTA,
Georgia, December 1, 1999
-- Georgia State University system regents tried to clarify their
intellectual property rights policy in 1994, but the issue remains
unsettled whether the regents or professors own what they write.
The regents' policy links ownership to the use of university resources.
But every campus is free to create its own policy which can either
add or subtract from the system-wide policy.
top
of page for all news
E-archive
would link research papers globally
SANTA FE,
New Mexico, December 2, 1999
-- Enthusiasts for linking research paper repositories around
the world put their ideas in a proposal form -- the Open Archives
project. Two dozen organizers said the archives could be operating
within a year if all goes well, allowing researchers to search
every participating repository with a single click. Stevan Harnad,
of the University of Southampton, said the goal "is to make all
the public archives in all the universities in the world into
one global, virtual archive."
top
of page for all news
Harvard
professor halts selling lecture videos
CAMBRIDGE,
Massachusetts, December 3, 1999
-- Harvard University law professor Arthur R. Miller stopped providing
videotapes of his lectures to the on-line Concord law school until
the issue of permissions is sorted through. Harvard argues that
Miller needs permission to teach elsewhere. Miller responds that
giving the tapes to Concord hardly constitutes teaching. Although
discontinuing the tapes, Miller said he may resume doing it in
the future.
top
of page for all news
Librarians:
Scholarly journals pad content
EVANSTON,
Illinois, December 4, 1999
-- Ten science librarians, led by Robert Michaelson at Northwestern
University, say some scholarly journals are padded with extraneous
material to keep the price high. Michaelson said a 1998 study
of the $4,900-a-year Journal of Molecular Structure, found
44 percent of the content was substandard or extraneous. Bibliographies,
as an example, are outmoded in this age of electronic data bases,
he said. In a letter to the editors of Molecular Structure,"
the editors said:
"We
strongly urged the journal's editorial board to eliminate, or
at least sharply reduce, the amount of extraneous material, resulting
in a proportional reduction in price."
top
of page for all news
TAA launches
direct-sale site for authors
ST. PETERSBURG,
Florida, December 4, 1999
-- The new Text and Academic Authors web site for authors to sell
their works directly to customers went on-line. Initially, 24
titles are listed on the TAA E-List for Books in four fields --
English, math, Portuguese and Spanish. The list will expand as
additional entries are received from TAA members. Rights to the
books belong to the authors, some of whom have regained the rights
from the original publisher. Some are self-publishers.
top
of page for all news
IFRRO chief
steps down to return to Norway
BRUSSELS,
December 5, 1999
-- The general secretary of the International Federation of Reproduction
Rights Organizations, Olav Stokkmo, resigned effective May 1 to
join a Norwegian publishing house. Said IFRRO chair André Beernsterboer:
"We lose a good friend as well as an excellent secretary general."
Earlier, Stokkmo had been the Number 2 person at KopinØr, the
Norwegian organization that collects and distributes royalties
for copyrighted materials in the country for distribution internally
and abroad to rightsholders. The federation board announced a
January 31 deadline for applications.
top
of page for all news
Elsevier:
Value-added j-articles can't be free
NEW YORK,
December 5, 1999
-- The giant academic journal publisher Elsevier would not open
up its contents to the free-access Open Archives system proposed
recently at a New Mexico meeting of scholars. Access to papers
should be limited to subscribers, said Arie Jongejan, Elsevier's
chief for physical sciences. Jongejan said Elsevier's peer review
process is a value-added feature which has value in the marketplace.
He said authors are free to link early drafts with Internet systems
like the proposed Open Archives.
top
of page for all news
Canadian
trust-busters OK Pearson divestiture
TORONTO,
December 6, 1999
-- The Canadian Competition Bureau, satisfied with Pearson's divesting
of five el-hi textbnook series, approved the merger of Pearson's
new acquired Prentice Hall and Addision Wesley Longman's Canadian
units. Sold to Canadian publishers were the French series Acti-Vie
by Irene Bernard and Beverly Amis, Enre Amis, and En
Direct, and the math series Interactions by Marian
Small and Jack Hope, and Journeys in Mathematics by Ralph
Connelly, Frank Marsh and others.
top
of page for all news
Editor:
Molecular Structure meets reader needs
COLLEGE
STATION, Texas, December 6, 1999
-- The co-editor of the Journal of Molecular Structure,
responded to criticism from research librarians that the journal
is bloated with useless content to keep the subscription rate
high. Jaan Laane, of Texas A&M, said that articles are peer-reviewed.
To a charge that bibliographies are reduntant to on-line data
bases and therefore unnecessary, Laane said the journal has many
overseas readers who need bibliographies with the articles. Even
so, Laane said he would pass the librarians' letter on to Elsevier
Science, the publisher.
top
of page for all news
TAA members
uged to submit to Teacher Channel
JACKSONVILLE,
Florida, December 7, 1999
-- The 20 percent royalties offered by Teacher Channel to members
of Text and Academic Authors for course materials is a good deal,
said Ron Pynn, TAA executive director. Pynn encouraged members
to contact Teacher Channel immediately, even before a formal arrangement
can be worked out by the association. Teacher Channel has proposed
not only 20 percent to authors but an additional five percent
to TAA. The proposal is on the association's executive board agenda
in January.
top
of page for all news
Librarians
may cancel "padded" subscriptions
EVANSTON,
Illinois, December 7, 1999
-- Science librarians will cancel costly subscriptions to journals
that bulk up their content with tertiary features. Robert Michaelson,
of Northwestern University, said cancellations would depend on
how publishers Elsevier Science and Wolters Kluwer respond to
a protest letter. Michaelson's group includes science librarians
at CalTech, Princeton, M.I.T. and Yale.
top
of page for all news
TAA
newsletter features English author
WINONA,
Minnesota, December 7, 1999
-- The new Academic Author newsletter, featuring English
professor Dorothy Seyler as the month's notable author, was mailed
to Text and Academic Authors members.
top
of page for all news
Exiting
Pearson author kept informed on sale
ST. CATHERINE'S,
Ontario, December 8, 1999
-- Canadian math author Ralph Connelly said he was kept abreast
of the pending government-owned sale of his series by Pearson
to Irwin, and even asked to sign off that he had been informed.
This was in contrast to Pearson authors in the United States whose
works were sold off, also under government pressure, without any
timely information from Pearson. Connelly said he had no role
in the sales but at least felt informed.
top
of page for all news
TAA E-List
now has 25 titles
CHAPEL
HILL, North Carolina, December 9, 1999
-- A North Carolina author, Catherine Lytle Sharp, posted the
first U.S. historical work on the E-List for Books sponsored by
Text and Academic Authors. Sharp's work, Frontier Family,
was edited from documents left by Aaron Boylan, who died in 1923
at age 96. It is the 25th book for sale directly from authors
on the E-List.
top
of page for all news
McGraw-Hill
sees expansion overseas
NEW YORK,
December 9, 1999 --
The publishing house McGraw-Hill announced plans to double its
foreign business. Overseas income now account for 20 percent of
the company's revenue.
top
of page for all news
TAA has
upcoming board vacancies
TWIN FALLS,
Idaho, December 9, 1999
-- The nominations chair for Text and Academic Authors, Peggy
Stanfield, called for candidates for three TAA Council seats that
will become vacant in June. Stanfield herself will be on the ballot
automatically as president-elect. Council members whose terms
are expiring:
- Dale
Layman (anatomy), Joliet Junior College.
- Paul
Rosenzweig (accounting), Royalty Review Service.
- Paul
Tippens (physics), Southern Polytechnic State University.
Stanfield
said the ballot will be shorter than usual because a bylaw change
has extended some terms.
top
of page for all news
IFRRO steps
up development plans
BRUSSELS,
December 9, 1999
-- The International Federation of Reproduction Rights Organizations
has recessed US$100,000 from member organization for developing
organizations in countries without them. Olav Stokkmo, IFRRO general
secretary, said new national organizations "are in the pipeline,"
but more contributions are needed. It is RRO's that collect royalty
fees for the copying of foreign works and then return the fees
to the country of origin.
top
of page for all news
Piracy
case ends with two-year probation
PORTLAND,
Oregon, December 10, 1999
-- The first prosecution under the 1997 No Electronic Theft Act
resulted in two years probation against a University of Oregon
student. Jeffrey G. Levy had established a MP3 music site that
was being tapped, with no royalty collections, at the rate of
1.7 gigabytes in a two-hour period. As a condition of probation,
the judge told Levy to stay off the Internet except for school
work.
top
of page for all news
B&N bows
to Germany on Mein Kampf
NEW YORK,
December 10, 1999
-- On-line book-seller Barnes & Noble acceded to German law and
blocked sales of Adolph Hitler's Mein Kampf to German customers.
The German Justice Department had reminded Barnes & Noble that
hate literature is banned in the country. The bookseller issued
a statement: "We do not believe censorship is a solution to any
of the world's problems.... However, as responsible corporate
citizens, we respect the laws of the countries where we do business."
top
of page for all news
Pearson
creates 9,000-activity learning site
BOSTON,
December 11, 1999
-- Publishing house Pearson Education launched a web site with
9,000 learning activities for on-the-job and other special training
programs. Called Destinations Internet, the site covers reading,
writing, math and life skills. It is operated by Pearson's Computer
Curriculum Corporation. The targets: On-job training for younger
workers, alternative high schools, correctional educational programs,
community colleges and public housing educational programs.
top
of page for all news
Wiley
offers rosy financial report
NEW YORK,
December 11, 1999
-- Shareholders at John Wiley & Sons are grinning ear-to ear.
College textbook sales rose 44 percent in the half, from April
to October, due largely to the Simon & Schuster titles acquired
from Pearson Education. Professional and trade sales, buoyed by
the acquisition of Jossey-Bass, rose 31 percent. Subscription
journal sales rose 11 percent.
top
of page for all news
Zi moving
into China web market
CALGARY,
Alberta, December 11, 1999
-- An educational software company, Zi Corporation, bought a Chinese
company that pioneered web-based education and training programs
in China. Zi said the Chinese Ministry of Education has promised
to help develop and distribute the software. Zi has offices in
Beijing and Hong Kong.
top
of page for all news
Hurry,
hurry, for Texty, McGuffey deadline
ST. PETERSBURG,
Florida, December 11, 1999
-- Publishers with last-minute entries for Texty and McGuffey
excellence awards should contact Janet Tucker, program coordinator
for Text and Academic Authors, to let her know they're coming.
The deadline: December 15. Tucker plans to send entries to judges
beginning next week.
top
of page for all news
Reed gives
up geographic structure to cut costs
LONDON,
December 12, 1999
-- Ailing Reed Elsevier, who global info empire includes academic
journal, is reorganizing internally around product lines instead
of its traditional nation-based setup. Chief executive Crispin
Davis said this will free funds to develop more web-delivered
products. The company, in part plagued by a Lexis-Nexis slowdown,
is also taking a $407 million charge in the face of a profit shortfall.
top
of page for all news
TAA members
send extra dollars, gifts too
ST. PETERSBURG,
Florida, December 15, 1999
-- More than 45 people contributed to Text and Academic Authors
this year with gift memberships and sustaining memberships. One
member gave TAA $1,000. The breakdown:
- Renewals
with gift memberships: 15.
- Contributors:
16, two with gift memberships and two with $100 gifts.
- Sustainers:
13, one with a gift membership.
Besides the
sustaining member who sent $1,000, two others gave $150 each.
top
of page for all news
PROFIT
LOSS
Millbrook:
Sales
rose 8 percent to $5.2 million in the latest quarter, compared
to a year earlier.
Scholastic:
Sales rose 26 percent to $507.8 million in the latest quarter,
compared to a year earlier. Educational sales rose 10 percent
to $51.4 million.
John Wiley:
Sales rose 22 percent to $150.3 million in the latest half, compared
to a year earlier.
top
of page for all news
Investment
firm adds Chelsea to stable
BROOMALL,
Pennsylvania, December 16, 1999
-- A school library publisher, Chelsea House, is changing hands.
A new player in the school library business, Haights Cross, bought
Chelsea from Main Line Book Company. Chelsea puts out 275 or so
titles a year. In other acquisitions, Haights Cross confirmed
these recent purchases:
- Educational
Design of New York, which produces standardized test-prep
materials.
- Recorded
Books of Frederick, Maryland, which produces audio books.
top
of page for all news
McGraw-Hill
shedding non-ed, non-biz units
NEW YORK,
December 16, 1999
-- McGraw-Hill, intent on focusing on educational and business
publications, plans to sell more subsidiary companies. Already,
the company has shed four trade magazines.
top
of page for all news
Ideal's
j-database growing to 150,000 articles
NEW YORK,
December 16, 1999
-- The Ideal electronic journal system, offered by Academic Press,
will add 43 journals to its offerings in January, the parent company,
Harcourt, announced. The new journals will be from Churchill,
Livingstone, Saunders and Bailliere Tindall. These are in addition
to 17 Churchill, Livingstone and Saunders titles already on the
system. With the latest additions, backfiles will include 150,000
articles in 200 journals back to 1993.
top
of page for all news
Teacher
Channel seeking course materials
JACKSONVILLE,
Florida, December 16, 1999
-- The Teacher Channel, anew on-line service, is developing a
web site to offer comprehensive class preparation materials for
teachers for "just in time" delivery. Materials will be available
by spring, said founder Doug Matthews said. The site will offer,"turn-key"
course materials in a form that can be downloaded from the web,
he said: "Course materials like this now exist in only a few teachers'
hands, in bits and pieces, and not in a compiled, down-loadable
form."
top
of page for all news
Financial
analysts expecting buyer for Reed
LONDON,
December 16, 1999
-- The announcement of an internal restructuring to cut costs
at Reed Elsevier sparked a 16 percent hike in the stock of parent
Reed International on the London Exchange, analysts said. Their
conclusion: A takeover may be imminent. Reed owns Lexis-Nexis
and produces many scientific and academic journals.
top
of page for all news
Excellence
awards narrowed to 12 titles
ST. PETERSBURG,
Florida, December 17, 1999
-- The field of publisher-nominated books for Texty and McGuffey
ecellence awards is narrower this year, said project coordinator
Janet Tucker. Nineteen authors asked to be nominated by their
publishers, compared to 22 last time and 32 the year before. Twelve
publishers followed through with nominations this time, compared
to 18 the last time and 22 the previous year.
top
of page for all news
Engineering
titles bring TAA E-List to 28
ANN ARBOR,
Michigan, December 18, 1999
-- A retired University of Michigan author, William Anderson,
posted three advanced engineering learning units the E-List for
Books sponsored by Text and Academic Authors. The list, intended
to help TAA members sell works to which they own rights, now has
28 titles.
top
of page for all news
Authors
challenge sweet insider deals
NEW YORK,
December 20, 1999
--Textbook authors could be affected a suit filed in a state court
by two authors who claim HarperCollins sold English-language editions
of their work to subsidiaries at below market rates. Possibly
affected are other authors who had Scott Foresman titles before
the company was sold by HarperCollins to Addison Wesley Longman,
an industry insider said. The sale to Addison Wesley Longman,
now part of Pearson Education, occurred only a few years back,
so those TAA members who had Scott Foresman titles could share
in the eventual settlement, the insider said. The suit was filed
by Ken Englade, a Western historical fiction author, and Patricia
Simpson, a romance writer. They seek class-action status.
top
of page for all news
Study examines
scholarly communication channels
NEW YORK,
December 20, 1999
-- The Association of American University Presses will begin a
four-year, $500,000 study of scholarly publishing in February.
Spokesperson Hollis Holmes the process by which scholarly work
is communicated will be studied. "A clear understanding of the
market for scholarly publications is imperative for sustaining
the financial health of scholarly communication and essential
to the fundamental mission of disseminating ideas," he said.
top
of page for all news
Delaware
replacing print journals with e-database
DOVER,
Delaware, December 21, 1999
-- After a three-year run, the University of Delaware is pleased
with getting journal articles from a database rather than through
nortmal subscriptions. The assistant director for library computing
systems, Greg Silvis, said keeping journals on the shelves was
running $20 to $50 per article that was used. The new system is
far less, he said. Articles are sent via Federal Express.
top
of page for all news
TAA awards
short a few judges
ST. PETERSBURG,
Florida, December 21, 1999
-- Most judges are in place for the 2000 Texty and McGuffey excellence
awards sponsored by Text and Academic Authors, projectr coordinator
Janet Tucker said. She still has vacancies in humanities and social
sciences, physical sciences, accounting and business, life sciences,
and computer science.
top
of page for all news
Wadsworth
shreds book after Islam complaint
BELMONT,
California, December 21, 1999
-- College textbook publisher Wadsworth yanked a marriage book
from the market after an Islamic group charged that the book offended
Islam women. The book, by David Knox and Caroline Schacht, carried
this passage:
"In
Islam, the most male-oriented of the modern religions, a woman
is nothing but a vehicle for producing sons."
The Council
of American-Islamic Relations objected. Wadsworth said the book,
Marriage and the Family, will be re-issued without the
offending wording and will carry a new ISBN.
top
of page for all news
Reed keeping
Cahners, other components
LONDON,
December 22. 1999
-- Reed Elsevier will continue in tact, said chief executive Crispin
Davis, scotching rumors that its Cahners trade journal unit and
perhaps other parts of the company were going on the block. Davis
said Cahners is expected to generate more profit from on-line
ventures. Also, he said, 150 Cahners positions, 3 percent of the
total, are being eliminated.
top
of page for all news
South-Western
keeps college, continuing-ed lists
NEW YORK,
December 22, 1999
-- The chief executive of Thomson Learning said the company's
South-Western college list is unaffected by the sale of the high
school list. Robert Christie said Thomson is focusing on corporate
training and continuing education, and the college lists, including
Wadsworth, fit the plan. Thomson is retaining the South-Western
name for its continuing business, office tech and computer programs.
top
of page for all news
U.S. copyright
industry outpaces economic growth
WASHINGTON,
December 24, 1999
-- Intellectual property grew in importance in the U.S. economy
in 1997, the International Intellectual Property Alliance said.
The growth rate, 6.3 percent, far exceeded the economy's 2.7 percent
average. By the end of 1997, the copyright industries produced
$348.4 billion worth of goods -- 4.3 percent of the nation's gross
domestic product, the report said.
top
of page for all news
American-Islamic
Council watches for slights
WASHINGTON,
December 24, 1999
-- The Council on American-Islamic Relations, which forced Wadsworth
to excise a sentence on Islam women in a marriage textbook, has
a record of monitoring books for offensive passages. In 1997 the
Council objected to Capstone Press and Simon & Schuster on passages
it found offensive, and both publishers withdrew the books.
top
of page for all news
Top
Authoring News of 1999
TOP
TEXT AND ACADEMIC AUTHORS ASSOCIATION NEWS OF 1999
COMPILER: KIM PAWLAK
Workshops continued to be a major membership tool in 1999.
The preliminary results of an author-publisher relations survey
conducted in 1998 were unveiled at Text and Academic Authors'
convention in June. More than 50 authors contributed to a
monograph for new TAA members. Here are the most important
activities TAA has initiated in 1999:
| 1. |
AUTHOR WORKSHOPS. Workshops brought in 143 new
members this year. This year workshops were held in
Tampa, Tennessee, California, Alabama and Texas. The
workshops, on writing textbooks and scholarly journals,
are funded by international reprography moneys returned
to the United States through the Authors Coalition.
|
| 2. |
LEADERSHIP. Law author Karen Morris ascended to
TAA's presidency. Morris, also a judge in Brighton Town,
New York, will continue the work of her predecessor,
Peggy Stanfield, and focus on membership. |
| 3. |
STAFF.The
TAA Council hired interim executive director Ron Pynn
as its half-time on-site executive director. Pynn's
goals are to expand member services and increase membership.
|
| 4. |
REPROGRAPHY MONEY TAA received $83,100 in reprography
moneys from the Authors Coalition for 1999. TAA treasurer
Mike Sullivan has projected $85,000. |
| 5. |
BUDGET. The TAA governing board approved a 3.7 percent
hike in the association's budget bringing it to a total
of $197,700. To make that budget, said TAA council member
Paul Rosenzweig, the association will need to grow by
400 members. |
| 6. |
CONTRACT SURVEY. According to a preliminary analysis
of open-ended questions in an author-publisher relations
survey conducted in late 1998, few textbook authors
feel their relationships with publishers are improving.
The TAA Contract Committee found only 10 respondents
saw improvements in recent years. A full analysis of
the survey is expected at the TAA Council meeting in
January. |
| 7. |
CONVENTION. Despite the loss of keynoter Pat Schroeder,
chief executive of the Association of American Publishers,
the June convention in Park City was called a resounding
success by convention chair Paul Tippens. Tippens goal
was to bring together authors, campus stores, publishers
and the CCC to discuss critical issues. He said three-quarters
of those goals were met. The convention drew high marks
from TAA members who gave responses like "excellent"
and "more next time," in their evaluations of the 17
sessions. |
| 8. |
AWARDS. Five textbooks have won 1999 Text and Academic
Authors William Holmes McGuffey awards for excellence
over many years. Five Textys were also presented. |
| 9. |
COUNCIL OF FELLOWS. Text and Academic Authors inducted
its first class of Fellows at its annual convention
in June. Six veteran authors, all TAA members, were
inducted into the TAA Council of Fellows, created to
honor those who have made significant contributions
to authoring. |
| 10. |
PUBLISHER DEAL. Text and Academic Authors began
exploring a deal with Alliance Press of Carrollton,
Texas, to publish TAA members' books with "author-friendly"
contracts. The TAA Council decided to gather more information
and discuss the deal in January before making a final
decision. |
| 11. |
MEMBER RECRUITMENT. A new membership recruiting
campaign, for 1,000 members by the year 2000, asks members
to nominate prospective members for TAA to contact.
For every one who signs up, the nominating author wins
a chance for hotel expenses, about $500, at TAA's 2000
convention in New Orleans. |
| 12. |
ARCHIVE DEDICATION. TAA dedicated the new textbook
archive at the University of South Florida-St. Petersburg
in January with 200-plus titles. |
| 13. |
TERMS EXTENDED. The TAA Council approved extending
the terms of president and vice president from one year
to two and Council terms from two years to three to
give the association's elected leadership more time
to follow up on initiatives. |
| 14. |
AUTHOR RIGHTS. The British Authors Licensing and
Collecting Society asked TAA to become a liaison for
U.S. authors by promoting their Declaration on the Rights
of Academic Authors during a trip to London by TAA President
Peggy Stanfield and Executive Director Ron Pynn in October.
|
| 15. |
CAMPUS CHAPTERS. TAA Executive Director Ron Pynn
invited campus members to consider being a host for
a free breakfast for authors both new and experienced
at their campuses. |
| 16. |
E-LIST.
TAA asked authors who hold the copyrights for their
books to participate in a new TAA service to list and
promote their works on-line. The E-list for Books allows
adopters and individual buyers to find and purchase
books directly from authors. |
| 17. |
TIPS MONOGRAPH. More than 50 experienced authors
contributed to a monograph for new TAA members. The
monograph will divided into 12 sections including: Choosing
a Publisher, Working with Coauthors and Marketing Your
Book. It is now available to TAA members. |
|
TOP
TEXT AND ACADEMIC AUTHORING
LAW NEWS OF 1999
COMPILER: KIM PAWLAK
The top academic authoring law story in 1997 and 1998, continues
to be the top story in 1999. Authors won an appeal in the
Tasini v. The New York Times copyright infringement
lawsuit. The New York Times was told by a federal appeals
court to stop recycling the work of freelance authors in digital
products. This latest ruling overturned a lower court ruling
for publishers. The ruling is unlikely to have any impact
on textbook authors, said authoring attorney Steve Gillen,
but the decision is a reminder to authors that as the electronic
marketplace becomes more significant and as the rate of technological
advancement increases, it will be all the more important to
pay attention to the rights transferred in publishing contracts.
The top academic authoring law news in 1999:
| 1. |
TASINI VICTORY. A federal appeals court decision
overturned a lower court ruling that publishers could
recycle the work of authors in sideline digital products.
The new ruling said that copyright law allows a publisher
to revise works it purchases, but digital recycling
without a writer's permission carries the concept of
"revision" too far. |
| 2. |
UNCOVER SUIT. U.S. District Court Judge Fern Smith
ruled that the case between a group of writers and Carl
Corporation may proceed as a class action suit. As many
as 2.745 authors may be involved in the copyright infringement
suit , Ryan et. al. v. Carl, which accuses UnCover,
a document retrieval company owned by Carl. Four authors
brought the case to court first in 1997, claiming that
authors retain rights to articles that are taken from
a collective work. The latest ruling allows the author
to sue on behalf of all authors whose rights have been
infringed upon by UnCover. |
| 3. |
NACS SUIT. A National Association of College Stores
federal suit says that VarsityBooks.com, an on-line
textbook seller, falsely implies that NACS member-stores
are overcharging. The result, says NACS, is "irreparable
damage" to brick-and-mortar stores. The suit charges
that VarsityBooks overstates its discount policy. NACS
said it will continue to go after on-line textbook sellers
that make false claims. |
|
TOP
ACADEMIC AUTHORING NEWS
OF 1999
COMPILER: KIM PAWLAK
Several journal publishers put their journals on-line in 1999.
One expert said that although all journals need to be on-line,
readers will continue to want print editions as well. Another
expert said the continuing need for print editions has increased
the cost of electronic journals instead of the expected decrease.
On-line peer review quickened the pace of journal article
publishing. Other top 1999 developments in academic authoring:
| 1. |
JOURNALS GO ON-LINE. Harvard Business Review
went on-line in January with 3,200 case studies. Sixty
colleges signed up. In February, publisher Churchill
Livingston & Saunders added 19 medical journals to an
on-line system called Ideal, operated by Harcourt, which
by November had 11,000 scientific journals with 150,000
article references dating back to 1993. Wiley Interscience
put 300 journals on-line and the German textbook publisher
Wolters Kluwer published 400 electronic journals |
| 2. |
FASTER REVIEW PROCESS. The Journal of the American
Medical Association unveiled a new peer-review process
that can put an article on-line in four weeks and in
the print journal within six weeks. Peer-reviewers are
given 48 hours in the new "JAMA Express" system. Medscape
General Medicine has a 72-hour reviewer turnaround
with on-line publishing in six weeks. The New England
Journal of Medicine has a system that puts articles
on-line nine weeks ahead of the print edition. |
| 3. |
ON-LINE PEER REVIEW. A University of Illinois team
developed technology to enable scholarly peer reviewers
to make spontaneous comments on-line as they read papers.
The innovation, by professor James Levin and graduate
student James Buell, allows reviewers to see each other's
comments. The result: A more collaborative exchange
among reviewers and authors and the ability for authors
to modify their papers on-line in response to reviewers.
For sample papers: |
| 4. |
WEB/PRINT JOURNALS. The publication director for
the Federation of American Societies for Experimental
Biology says every journal needs to be on-line but that
print editions also will survive. Ed Rekas said that
readers, depending on what they're reading, might prefer
either print or web versions. Both, he said, have advantages
and disadvantages. |
| 6. |
JOURNAL COPYRIGHTS. Faculty concern over retaining
the copyrights to their articles in scholarly journals
never jelled at the California Institute of Technology
even after Provost Steven Koonin posed the issue of
lost access. Koonin said he was surprised that the issue
of turning over and losing rights to their work didn't
"grab the working faculty." He said he will try again
later.
Detaius:
Complete
story
|
| 7. |
JOURNAL PRICING. A University of Michigan experiment
with the journal publisher Elsevier found encouraging
preliminary data. The project, Pricing Electronic Access
to Knowledge, or PEAK, tested different pricing structures
for electronic versions of Elsevier's 1,100 journals. |
| 8. |
TRIMMING PAGES. Time, economic pressure and a dwindling
audience have caused many scholarly presses to seek
shorter manuscripts. Publisher say it is a sign of the
times. Authors say it is actually a good thing, helping
them retain their focus. |
| 9. |
ACCESSIBLE SCHOLARLY WORKS. The Scholarly Publishing
and Academic Resources Coalition announced $500,000
in grants at $100,000 each to projects that will "transform
the scholarly communication process." |
|
TOP
TEXTBOOK NEWS
OF 1999
COMPILER: KIM PAWLAK
The growth of on-line textbook sellers like VarsityBooks.com,
BarnesandNoble and BigWords.com, and the controversy over
who has the best deal, on-line stores or brick-and-mortar,
was just one of the ways the Internet has changed the textbook
world in 1999. E-publishing, the practice of publishing textbooks
solely on the web, and the creation of sites that list works
for sale by those whose copyrights have reverted back to the
authors are others. A plan by the Pennsylvania University
System Board of Regents to confiscate faculty-author royalties
and the anti-trust approval of Pearson's acquisition of Simon
& Schuster textbooks also topped the list of 1999's biggest
textbook stories:
| 1. |
PEARSON
MERGER. Pearson Education leaped the last anti-trust
hurdle in its bid to merge with Simon & Schuster's textbook
subsidiaries. The government dismissed objections from
five authors and a publisher to the Pearson Education
acquisition of Simon & Schuster textbooks. The Justice
Department said that competition would not be hurt by
the deal as long as the merged company divested 55 titles
to other companies. |
| 2. |
AUTHOR
ROYALTIES. Text and Academic Authors criticized
a Pennsylvania proposal to generate revenue by claiming
royalties from textbooks and other intellectual property
produced by authors. TAA Executive Director Ron Pynn
sent letters to editors throughout the state, calling
the proposal ill-advised. The Pennsylvania University
System's faculty union successfully blocked the proposal. |
| 3. |
E-PUBLISHING.
Fatbrain attracted 1,400 authors to its e-publishing
site in the first two weeks of its eMatter program.
Works on the password-protected site generate 50 percent
royalties for authors and publishers. |
| 4. |
PUBLISHING
PROFITS. By July, book sales had found gains in
every genre. Science, medical technical and business
books were up 11.7 percent. College texts were up 2.9
percents and el-hi adoptions, 3.2 percent. |
|
5. |
SUBSCRIPTION
WEB TEXT. Biology author Henry Tedeschi self-published
the first subscription web text in his field. Cell
Physiology: Molecular Dynamics. Access is through
an ID and password. |
|
6. |
PEARSON
PURCHASE. Publisher John Wiley & Sons bought a package
of 54 titles that federal anti-trust required Pearson
Education to sell before its purchase of Simon & Schuster
textbooks could be finalized. |
| 7. |
ONLINE
TEXTBOOKS. Publishers began putting their textbooks
on-line in 1999. Wadsworth put four of its American
government textbooks on the Bravo International Learning
Network. |
| 8. |
ON-LINE
BOOK SALES. On-line book sellers gobbled up sales
with marketing programs aimed at students' wallets and
time. Some of the biggest were VarsityBooks.com, with
discounts of as much as 40 percent on its 400,000 titles
for 45,000 courses, and Barnes and Noble's on-line web
sales site, www.textbook.com, which went on-line in
February with six million titles. Brick-and-mortar stores
fought back with their own web sales sites, saying that
with them, students would get the best of both worlds.
|
| 9. |
PRICE
COMPARISON. Text and Academic Authors conducted
a price comparison of 20 leading textbooks at both traditional
campus stores and web sites found confused pricing structures.
No pattern was found. |
|
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