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February
2000
- 2000
TAA LEADERS
- Wolters
leads STM/professional deals
- McGraw
offers huge database to profs, students
- Reed
cuts costs for Internet development cash
- Profit
pressure on at Bertelsmann unit
- Georgia
author accepts TAA vice-presidency nod
- HarperCollins:
We're innocent on inside swapping
- Authors
says HarperCollins self-traded their books
- McGraw
sells five printing plants
- New
newsletter issue sent to TAA members
- Math
titles bring TAA E-List to 30
- Distance-learning
programs propagate
- TAA
leaders share personal, association goals
- Thomson
acts on Marriage for attribution lapse
- Text
drops Islam references: "Inadequately cited"
- NetPaper
executive on TAA program
- TAA
news site reports record 629 stories
- College,
el-hi sales remain on roll
- VarsityBooks.com
going for college borrowers
- Membership
push on slow track
- New
TAA recruiting brochures in mail
- TAA
invites write-ins for governing board
- Shipboard
TAA convention remains possibility
- PROFIT
LOSS
- TAA
adjusts budget to address shortfall
- TAA
leaders vote to keep focused
- TAA
authorizes prototype authoring journal
- Academic
Press OKs 4,000 articles for web
- Pynn:
National office staff stable, efficient
- Adam.com
widens outlets with licensing
- TAA
membership losses offset increases
- TAA
holds dues at $60
- TAA
experimenting with regional, campus chapters
- Books24x7.com
bolsters tech titles
- TAA
widens net for out-of-print publishing partners
- American
Education acquires Dolphin software
- Speech
pathology author on TAA ballot
- TAA
considers authors' suit against HarperCollins
- Royalty
auditor: No author has been bounced
- Music
change stymies Norway repro-agency
- TAA
to CCC: Get your facts straight
- Tiptina's
diversion planned at New Orleans convention
- TAA
hopes members shift on-line
- Reed
orders major central-staff reduction
- TAA
seeks multiple out-of-print titles outlets
- Mississippi
plans 2000 el-hi adoptions
- Norway:
Copying of foreign works grows
- North
Carolina editor leaves for Cambridge
- Sociology
society castigated over book mailing
- Oxford
English Dictionary going on-line
- French
e-reader to debut in March
- Several
societies sold lists for eugenics title
- College
site offers BigWord texts
- Kaplan
buys Schweser, to drop Temte name
- Transaction:
Book or ad, what's difference?
- Harper
authors: Inside deals profited News Corp.
- Customizable
textbook-geared study guides coming
- 98
percent of students buy texts on campus
- Two
book execs caught in AOL merger
- Next
TAA newsletter features prolific math author
- Norwegian
reprography mostly of texts, nonfiction
- Education,
reference books continue sales pace
- Publishers
cautioned on e-book pricing
- Scholars:
Bertelsmann indeed had Nazi ties
- Pearson's
U.S. stake gaining market, profits
- Author
scrapping 60,000 copies of own work
- Publishers
adopt standard book-tracking format
- Microsoft
exec: Days of paper books numbered
- Veteran
Cornell Press editor resigns
- Teacher
Channel gathering instructional materials
- TeacherChannel
aims at teachers new to subject
- Besser
findings figure into new text
- TAA
scholarly funding contributes to ad text
- Pearson
to put royalty checks in mail earlier
- Authors:
Publishers dally on royalty checks
- TAA
president applauds Pearson royalty move
PROFIT LOSS
Educational Insights:
Sales rose 21 percent to $39.2 million in the latest year.
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NuvoMedia lines
up British, German ebooks
LONDON, February
1, 2000
-- A NuvoMedia e-book executive, Ingo Reese, said at least 500 titles
will be available this year for Rocket eBook readers in English , French
and German this year. Also, 300 German titles are licensed, said Reese,
who is NuvoMedia's international development director.
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Leading academics
editing new web study guides
PRINCETON, New Jersey,
February 1, 2000 -- The on-line study guides being prepared by Final-exam.com
could replace textbooks, publisher Jack Goodman said. In major fields,
the leading survey textbooks are look-alikes, he said. His study guides,
$11.95 on-line, cover all the bases and can include adopter's individual
additional content. The guides themselves, he said, are being written
by academics under the editorship of several leading scholars, some
of them textbook authors themselves:
James Brady
(chemistry), St. John's University.
Alan Brinkley (U.S. history), Columbia University.
David Colander (economics), Middlebury College.
James Gould (biology), Princeton University.
Jack Peltason (political science), University of California at
Irvine.
Barry Schwartz (psychology), Swathmore College.
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Utah says no to
textbook tax exemption
SALT LAKE CITY,
Utah, February 1, 2000 -- An attempt to exempt college textbooks from
the state sales tax has failed. State Rep. Duane Bourdeaux, who sponsored
the bill, said it failed because an exemption would cost $1.6 million
in losses to the state's general fund and local and transit revenues.
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Illegal copying
case settled in Norway
OSLO, Norway February
1, 2000 -- An Oslo-based copy shop that reproduced books en toto without
royalty permission payments agreed to a $12,500 settlement. The funds
will go to Kopinor, the national reprography collection and distribution
agency, and be given to the copyright holders of the works.
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Oxford cites U.S.
web usage for on-line OED
LONDON, February
1, 2000 -- Quantum increases in web usage in the United States factored
into the Oxford University Press decision to put the Oxford English
Dictionary on-line in March, said chief executive John Simpson.
The day is coming, he said, when academics look first to on-line for
reference and textual materials. Web access will be by subscription,
scaled so institutions pay more than individuals. The second edition
of the 20-volume OED, a print product, have totaled 20,000 and
seemed to have peaked. Observers doubt whether a third print edition,
scheduled for 2010, will ever appear.
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Lawyer to relate
new contract complexity
NEW ORLEANS, Louisiana,
February 1, 2000 -- Publishing lawyer Steve Gillen, from Cincinnati
law firm Frost & Jacobs, agreed to serve on a panel on contract negotiations
at the Text and Academic Authors national convention in New Orleans
in June. Gillen's portion of the presentation will be called "Negotiating
for Electronic Rights: When to Hold 'Em, When to Fold 'Em." He will
discuss:
- Just what
are electronic rights? It's more complicated than you may think,
Gillen says.
- What the publisher
needs. Believe it or not, said Gillen, the publisher may need
your help to figure this out.
- What you should
keep? What do you do with it -- and what the heck is a BATNA anyway?
- What questions
you should ask? And when you should ask them.
- What a bad
deal looks like. To illustrate this, Gillen will analyze contract
language from real deals.
Gillen also will
do a role playing exercise that he says will help attendees "understand
why the negotiation with their publisher is not a zero sum game."
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Author, editor,
self-publisher on TAA ballot
TWIN FALLS, Idaho,
February 1, 2000 -- A California textbook author, Y.H. Hui, agreed to
be on the ballot for the Text and Academic Authors governing board,
nominations chair Peggy Stanfield announced. Hui, known to friends as
Y.H., received his doctorate in nutritional biochemistry from the University
of California at Berkeley in 1970. He taught nutrition and food science
at Humboldt State University from 1971 to 1987. Since 1987 he has devoted
full time to writing, also serving as a publishing consultant. From
1992 to 1995, he was appointed editor-in-chief for the United States
Association for Food and Drug Officials. He has authored or edited 19
books on human nutrition, food science, food technology, and food law.
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Nominated books
en route to TAA judges
ST. PETERSBURG,
Florida, February 1, 2000 -- Entries in the Texty and McGuffey excellence
awards sponsored by Text and Academic Authors have been mailed to judges,
coordinator Janet Tucker said. The winners will be announced ahead of
the association's June convention in New Orleans. Presentations will
be at the convention.
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Multiculturalism
critic gets "cold shoulder"
BROOKLINE, Massachusetts,
February 1, 2000 -- A Harvard University researcher said she's become
a pariah for her criticism of multiculturalism in basal readers. "People
in the field of education give me the cold shoulder" for her book Losing
Our Language, said Susan Stotsky. She criticizes the time and space
given to toleration lessons in lieu of basic skills. "The real victims
become the very children they're doing all of this for," she said. Stotsky
also is a deputy Massachusetts state education commissioner.
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Research: Multiculture
"stew" confuses pupils
BROOKLINE, Massachusetts,
February 1, 2000 -- An emphasis on cultural diversity is cluttering
reading textbooks and confusing pupils, said Sandra Stotsky, deputy
Massachusetts education commissioner, in her book, Losing Our Language:
How Multicultural Classroom Instruction is Undermining Our Children's
Ability to Read, Write, and Reason.
Stotsky said valuable
time and space are given to toleration lessons in lieu of basic skills,
hurting the very kids that need the exposure to English. "The real victims
become the very children they're doing all of this for," said Stotsky:
low-income black and Hispanic kids.
This is what Stotsky
concluded after researching three decades of basal readers:
- As the move toward
"multiculturalism" in schools began in the 1970s, basal readers, meant
to teach children to read, became a platform for teaching about minority
groups and other cultures, with the addition of dialects like "Japanglish"
and "Spanglish" and multicultural names and foreign words into the
stories.
- A "dumbing down"
of the content used in basal readers. Instead of the complex vocabularies
and sentence structures used in selections from Black Beauty
and other children's classics used in the early 1900s, publishers
began simplifying the selections, making the sentences shorter and
cutting out challenging words. This "dumbing down" got worse, she
found, as the students progressed, until sixth graders were reading
selections that would have been previously given to fourth graders.
The use of multicultural
names and foreign words, said Stotsky, creates a "language stew" that
does nothing to teach children English. "Multicultural names are academically
useless words that children don't meet again," said Stotsky. "Teachers
end up having to spend a lot of time teaching kids how to pronounce
names and foreign words." That's time, she said, that could be used
to introduce words that appear in more difficult English prose.
Stotsky, also a
Harvard Graduate School of Education research associate, said she wrote
the book to alert parents, teachers and publishers to what she found.
For the most part, she said, the book has received very positive reviews.
She has been a guest on more than 30 radio talk shows since the book
was published in February 1999. "I did not expect to receive a warm
response in schools of education," she said. And she hasn't: "People
in the field of education give me the cold shoulder," she said. "They
don't want to know they are part of the problem, not the solution."
Basal readers, said
Stotsky, are not there to teach kids about diversity but to teach them
how to read. "By the time editors in publishing houses get done pleasing
all of the specialty groups and get all of the moralizing in, there's
no wiggle room for the quality of the vocabulary and stories," she said.
It's easy to say
that publishers are the problem, she said, but they are under a lot
of pressure to produce books that will be adopted in big adoption states
like Texas, California and Oregon. "One has to feel some sympathy for
publishers who are required to regurgitate all the fashionable mantras
du jour," Stotsky wrote. "Even if they collaborate willingly with the
dictates of the regulators, some editors must resent having to demonstrate
so repetitively their allegiance to the pieties of the day and adhere
to such detailed regulations on the groups to be represented."
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California may exempt
texts from sales tax
SACRAMENTO, California,
February 1, 2000 -- Legislator Denise Moreno Ducheny is trying again
to exempt textbooks from the 6 percent state sales tax. Her proposal
will be introduced as a new bill sometime this year, following a setback
in a committee last session. If approved, California would join New
York, Oklahoma and Virginia in recent legislation exempting textbooks
from sales taxes.
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California ponders
textbook tax exception
LOS ANGELES, California,
February 1, 2000 -- An effort in California by state Assemblywoman Denise
Moreno Ducheny to exempt college textbooks from state sales taxes will
be introduced as a brand new bill sometime this year, according to Kevin
McCarty, a higher education consultant for Ducheny.
The biggest obstacles
to the bill, says McCarty, are the dollar amount and whether or not
the state can affort this type of tax relief. California's state sales
tax is 6 percent. California earned $34.5 million from taxes on textbooks
out of total tax revenues of more than $28 billion, according to a 1998
state study.
Lobbying for the
new bill began with two California college students, Ryan Simpkins,
of Orange Coast College, and Toby Sexton, of California State Long Beach.
Now supported by Ducheny, who said she sees it as way to lessen financial
costs for students, the bill has already hit its first obstacle. It
had been attached as an amendment to an existing bill that primarily
deals with bank and corporation taxes, but that effort fell through
in committee. With that bill no longer a viable vehicle for the textbook
exemption amendment, the group now has to get it introduced as a separate
bill.
Similar bills have
passed in New York, Oklahoma and Virginia but failed in Texas, Connecticut
and Illinois. McCarty said California is one of the few states that
still charges state sales taxes for college textbooks.
Passed:
New York, 4 percent
Oklahoma, 4.5 percent
Virginia, 4.5 percent
Failed:
Texas 6.25 percent
Connecticut 6 percent
Illinois 6.25 percent
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HarperCollins class-action
details due soon
NEW YORK, February
2, 2000 -- Attorneys for the two authors who claim that HarperCollins
sold their books to other HarperCollins units at below-market rates
said they will make their motion for a class action suit within the
next two months. The suit, by authors Ken Englade and Patricia Simpson,
asked the court to order a royalty review and independent audit not
only on their behalf but also for thousands of HarperCollins authors
whose books were also sold in-house. Englade and Simpson claim that
HarperCollins breached its authors' contracts by selling to its own
related and affiliated publishing companies "at a considerable discount
well below fair market value, thus earning each author less royalties
than is mandated in each contract."
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Northern Kentucky
debating authors' income
HIGHLAND HEIGHTS,
Kentucky, February 2, 2000 -- Campus leaders are considering a revision
in the claim of Northern Kentucky University on the royalty income of
professors who write textbooks. Rogers Redding, academic vice president,
said the proposal is complex but "tries to strike a fair balance between
the creator and the owner of the equipment or between individual efforts
and university-assigned efforts." The issue is who owns intellectual
property created by professors. Gaut Ragsdale, faculty president, said
the ownership policy had been cloudy. The revision, taking form, leaves
professors with all the rights to what they produce as individuals,
even if they use university's infrastructure.
Text and Academic
Authors has consistently opposed university proposals to tap into faculty
royalty income. Among reasons: It would discourage the exchange and
expansion of human knowledge by diminishing a financial incentive to
create learning materials.
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Wisconsin Press
eyes fiction
MADISON, Wisconsin,
February 3, 2000 -- The University of Wisconsin, looking for profits
as are most university presses these days, may take a foray into fiction.
Editor Raphael Kadushin said he is pushing an anthology on university
life, The Student Body edited by John McNally. Among authors:
Steven King and Richard Russo. The decision is up to the press' editorial
board.
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TAA leader: Confiscation
threatens society
POWDER SPRING, Georgia,
February 5, 2000 -- Continuing attacks on the creators of intellectual
property are frightening, said TAA Council member Paul Tippens, noting
a raft of university proposals in recent years to take a slice of professors'
royalty income. Such battles over intellectual property, "quite frankly,
scare me," Tippens said. "Privacy and ownership of property are the
cornerstones that protect our freedom as individuals from the state.
The government steals (through taxation) from those who earn money in
order to provide for those who don't. Must the government (or universities)
steal from the creators in order to satisfy the desires of those who
'manage' or 'provide' for them? Maybe for sponsored research, but certainly
not for the 'ideas' and 'creative' works in print."
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Reed talked up as
Miller Freeman player
SAN FRANCISCO, California,
February 6, 2000 -- The Europe-based trade publisher Reed Elsevier may
buy a major stake in the Miller Freeman publishing house, which also
sponsors trade shows, according to news reports. Miller Freeman's owner,
United News & Media, has wanted to sell 40 percent of the company.
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Wadsworth, Harcourt
exchange140 college titles
BELMONT, California,
February 6, 2000 -- The Wadsworth publishing house agreed to give 40
freshman and developmental English and technical communication titles
to Harcourt, in exchange for 100 education titles. Among Wadsworth's
gains:
- Bernice Cullinan,
Literature and the Child, fourth edition.
- Donald Ary, Lucy
Jacobs and Asghar Razavieh, Introduction to Research in Education.
- Lee Galda, Bernice
Cullin and Dorothy Strickland, Language, Literature and the Child.
- Paul George and
Robert Alexander, The Exemplary Middle Schools.
- Robert Gagne
and Walter Wagner, Principles of Instructional Design. Among
Harcourt gains:
- Judy Rogers and
Glenn Rogers, Patterns and Themes: A Basic English Reader.
- William Salamone
and Stephen McDonald, Inside Writing: A Writer's Workbook.
The swap was even,
no cash exchanged, Wadsworth said.
Company
announcement
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Northern Kentucky
recognizes author rights
HIGHLAND PARK, Kentucky,
February 7, 2000 -- Northern Kentucky University regents approved a
policy to recognize the intellectual property rights of faculty members
regardless of whether they use university office space, library resources,
office computers, supplies, equipment, facilities or personnel. The
faculty president, Gaut Ragsdale, regards the revised policy as author-friendly.
The policy gives the university rights only if university specifically
assigned the work to the faculty member.
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Northern Kentucky
favors authors on rights
HIGHLAND HEIGHTS,
Kentucky, February 7, 2000 -- Northern Kentucky University regents approved
a policy that gives intellectual property rights to the faculty member
regardless of whether they use university office space, library resources,
office computers, supplies, equipment, facilities or personnel. The
university is given rights to the work only if it helped pay for it
or if the work specifically assigned to the faculty member. Faculty
also retain rights to work created through a sabbatical, fellowship
or faculty grant.
The policy was adopted
six months after Northern Kentucky faculty objected to a former policy
being circulated on campus that gave all rights to the university. Gaut
Ragsdale, faculty president, says the new policy protecting authors.
The policy, he said, is a "living" one, that is likely to be refined
as the influence of new technologies on intellectual property becomes
more apparent.
Creation of the
policy was a collaborative effort between the university's legal counsel,
faculty members from the law school and various academic departments.
An intellectual property committee, appointed by the provost, will now
oversee any disagreements regarding ownership.
NKU's
intellectual property rights policy
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British society:
Let authors keep copyright
LONDON, February
10, 2000 -- A model license that lets authors keep the copyright to
their journal articles has been drafted by the Association of Learned
and Professional Society Publishers. The license would give authors
greater control of their work. While not mandatory, the guidelines seem
acceptable to scientific, medical and technical publishers that are
affiliated with the society, including Elsevier and Blackwell Science.
Said Blackwell sales director Ian Banneman: "As long as we can secure
the rights we need to exploit the work on behalf of authors, there should
not be a problem."
ALPSP
copyright policy draft
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Pegasus seeks central
Canadian library role
TORONTO, February
11, 2000 -- The largest Canadian book wholesaler, Pegasus, opened a
distribution arm for Canada's 10,000 school libraries and 450 public
libraries. Vice President Peter Strachan said the Pegasus goal is high
discounts and efficiency for libraries dealing with Pegasus as a single
source. Until Pegasus, Canadian libraries dealt with numerous suppliers,
all with less than 10 percent of the market. The Pegasus model, Strachan
said, is Baker & Taylor's library service in the United States.
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Phoenix, Learn2.com
in partnership
HUNTSVILLE, Alabama,
February 11, 2000 -- K-12 biology, history, math and science courses
developed by Phoenix Multimedia will be distributed by Learn2.com, the
company announced.
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Yale editor to
North Carolina Press
CHAPEL HILL, North
Carolina, February 11, 200 -- The editor-in-chief at Yale University
Press, Charles Grench, was named senior editor at the University of
North Carolina Press. Grench said he decided to move to do more work
on history and African-American studies. Also, Grench said, he knows
several Chapel Hill press people who were at Yale during his 25 years.
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McGraw-Hill sales
in solid gain
NEW YORK, February
11, 2000 -- Professional and text sales paced growth at McGraw-Hill
in the latest fiscal year. Sales overall grew 7 percent to $4.0 billion.
Professional sales rose 11.6 percent to $133 million. School publishing
sales rose 9.8 percent to $913 million. College sales rose 9.4 percent
to $393 million.
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NetPaper.com sees
role in custom niche
WOBURN, Massachusetts,
February 11, 2000 -- Start-up company NetPaper.com has a niche in the
learning materials business with a lot of upside possibilities, said
John Baack, director of publisher relations. "There is nobody who is
an overlay of us," said Baack. NetPaper.com's only customers are colleges
and universities. Other custom and coursepack businesses, he said, also
have customers on the commercial side. The company has installed its
software at Cornell University to facilitate self-publishing. So far,
faculty have created 300 coursepacks using the system, Baack said.
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NetPaper.com sees
role in custom niche
WOBURN, Massachusetts,
February 11, 2000 -- Start-up company NetPaper.com has a niche in the
learning materials business. John Baack, director of publisher relations,
said the internet and e-commerce organization can facilitate the selection,
arrangement and printing of intellectual property. No other company,
he said, is "in this space, at this time."
"There is nobody
who is an overlay of us," said Baack. NetPaper.com is the only company
of its kind, he said, whose customers are strictly colleges and universities.
Other custom and courspack businesses also have customers on the commercial
side.
NetPaper.com, formerly
PubWeb, was founded by Graeme Keeping and Mark Miller two years ago.
Since NetPaper.com was PubWeb's base product line, said Baack, it seemed
a better name for the company. "PubWeb doesn't describe the business
as well as NetPaper does," he said. The company, now being backed by
German-based venture capitalists, has recently begun some new initiatives.
In January, the
company installed a printer at Cornell University which supports NetPaper's
software, called CAMPUS, which facilitates self-publishing on college
campuses. Faculty at Cornell have so far created 30 coursepacks using
the system. "Cornell has 300 coursepacks on its campus," said Baack.
"Each term they create another 300 to 350 coursepacks."
The company also
plans another installation at the University of Alberta.
Although this hasn't
been done this yet, the printer can also open a portal to publishers
on other campuses, allowing faculty to draw upon other publications.
The company expects to install printers at at least a dozen more universities
next year. "We want to provide an ability for coursepacks to be developed
and for professors to self-publish," he said.
Baack said he believes
the NetPaper system will also find substantial usage with major college
publishers. "Whether large commercial publishers realize it or not,
they could publish a large number of books using our system," said Baack.
There are more and more books in digital form, he said: "Digital books
can be made available through the NetPaper system, for example, to authors
who need to do frequent updating."
NetPaper.com, said
Baack, provides publishers and authors the ability to put together coursepacks
that have selections from disparate sources, which can be printed on
demand. Baack will be speaking at Text and Academic Authors' convention
in New Orleans in June, on a panel entitled "Assembling All the Parts
for Publication, Including Visuals."
"When I speak to
authors I'll get into the e-commerce part of print-on-demand and outline
the type of material that it is especially suited for," said Baack.
"Authors would be interested in keeping their books alive once publishers
don't want to publish them any more. They may also be interested in
the ability to put works in a digital form, allowing them to be combined
with other works using the NetPaper system."
NetPaper.com offers
authors the ability to be their own publisher, said Baack. Authors simply
give NetPaper their content in digital form, PDF or postscript, and
NetPaper puts it up on the web, allowing access to it by parties identified
by the author. "Publishers or other organizations must serve as publishers
of the materials, providing the logo, doing the billing, and providing
the customer service," he said. "We are the facilitator and the pipeline
and expect to remain totally in the background." With NetPaper, they
distribute, then print.
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Duke starting Latin
cultural journal
DURHAM, North Carolina,
March 11, 2000 -- A new journal on Latin American cultural theory, Nepantla:
Views From the South, will be done at Duke University Press, the
board decided.
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Wiley sales rising
with Pearson titles
NEW YORK, February
11, 2000 -- Publisher John Wiley & Sons is making good on the higher-ed
titles that were spun off from Pearson Education. Higher-ed sales, boosted
by the Pearson titles, grew 44 percent in the latest six-month reporting
period. Overall, Wiley sales rose 17 percent to $287.3 million.
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Stanfield set for
return to TAA presidency second, third years
ST. PETERSBURG,
Florida, February 11, 2000 -- Health and nutrition author Peggy Stanfield
may be the first Text and Academic Authors member to serve three years
as the association's president. In a transition necessitated by a by-law
change, Stanfield went from president in 1998-99 to vice president and
president-elect. That put her in line for president again, this time
for a two-year term. Barring someone else's write-in campaign, Stanfield
will move to the presidency in June. Only one other TAA leader, Ron
Pynn, has served twice as president. Both times were back in the times
of one-year terms.
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Wadworth: Sales
OK for criticized family text
BELMONT, California,
February 11, 2000 -- An unpleasant flap over references to Islam family
life in a new marriage textbook have not hurt sales, said Susan Badger,
president of Wadsworth, which published the book and then pulled it
out of circulation, pasted over the offending lines, and issued an erata
sheet. "The authors and our editorial team worked closely together"
to determine "a response that the academic community would recognize
as appropriate," said Badger. The book, Marriage in the Family,
by David Knox and Caroline Schacht, had been critcized by an Islamic
advocacy group.
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Wadsworth: Deletions
academically "appropriate"
BELMONT, California,
February 11, 2000 -- Wadsworth Publishing president Susan Badger said
that the decision to excise non-factual references to Islamic religion
from a new sociology textbook has had no adverse impact on sales.
"We feel strongly
that the integrity of the textbook, its authors and the publisher were
not compromised in any way," said Badger.
The textbook, Marriage
in the Family: A Brief Introduction, by David Knox and Caroline
Schact, sociology professors at East Carolina University, had included
passages that the Council on American-Islamic Relations, a Washington-based
Islamic advocacy group, said were not factual. CAIR persuaded Wadsworth
to obliterate the passages. "CAIR's concern was also addressed fairly,"
Badger said.
Wadsworth ceased
distribution of the textbook, taking all undistributed books and placing
a sticker over the offensive passages. An errata sheet containing changes
to the text were circulated to books that have already been distributed.
New editions will not contain the excised passage and will contain a
new ISBN, Badger said.
"The authors and
our editorial team worked closely together to determine an appropriate
response to CAIR's concerns, while at the same time seeking a response
that the academic community would recognizeas appropriate," said Badger.
"We worked on this over a period of several weeks, going back and forth
with alternatives and running all of them past the authors."
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Harry Potter
tops censors' list
NEW YORK, February
12, 2000 -- The most feared books on school library shelves are in the
Harry Potter series, according to a report from the Association of American
Publishers. No other book received more demands for removal from classrooms,
libraries and reading lists in 1999, the association reported.
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TAA must create
author rights white paper
POWDER SPRING, Georgia,
February 12, 2000 -- Text and Academic Authors must draft a "white paper"
to describe intellectual property that rightfully belongs to authors,
said TAA Council member Paul Tippens. About recent attempts by colleges
to claim royalty income from faculty authors, Tippens said: "Currently
others are defining intellectual property for us," he said. "If the
ax strikes the tree long enough, the tree will fall." Tippens said ithat
TAA must clearly support the concept that creators own the works they
create.
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Royalty, accounting
firms merge; more services result
NEW YORK, February
13, 2000 -- Royalty Review Service, which audits publishers' bookkeeping
for authors, and an entertainment and sports accounting firm have joined
into a new firm: R&M Royalty Review. Paul Rosenzweig, a principal in
Royalty Review Service, called the combination "a natural fit." The
new firm's scope includes not only books and literary licenses but also
electronic, radio and video sales. These are important services in a
period when mergers and new technologies are disrupting royalty systems,
Rosenzweig said. Gail Gross directs the New York office as chief operating
officer. Rosenzweig, now living in California, is spending more time
with West Coast clients. Rosenzweig, a frequent presenter at TAA conventions
for many years, was elected to TAA Council in 1996 and re-elected in
1998. Gross is a TAA member.
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Survey: Copyright
has psychological value
LONDON, February
13, 2000 -- A model licensing agreement to leave the copyright on journal
articles with the authors grew out of a survey of British authors. Sally
Moore, secretary general of the Association of Learned and Professional
Society Publishers, said the survey found authors take a psychological
value in owning the copyright: "It is their work, it belongs to them,
and they obviously feel very attached to it." The question now, Moore
said, is whether authors will be more attracted to journals that embrace
the ALPSP model licensing agreement.
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TAA leader: Gag
clauses are undeserved harassment
TWIN FALLS, Idaho,
February 13, 2000 -- The gag clause that Houghton-Mifflin has inserted
into new contracts is an undeserved slap at authors, said Peggy Stanfield,
TAA president-elect. To bind authors into silence about their contracts
ignores the reality that most leaks are from inside the house, Stanfield
said: "Editors who leave angry for another publisher, at least some
of them, take the 'secrets' with them." She added: "Publishers should
clean up their internal leaks before harassing authors."
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Media firms favor
sales-tax exemption
WASHINGTON, February
14, 2000 -- The Advisory Commission on Electronic Commerce is being
encouraged by some major players in book publishing to extend the state
sales-tax exemption on Internet sales to 2006. Among commission members
pushing for the extension are soon-to-be-merged America Online and Time
Warner. The commission is preparing a recommendation to Congress. The
current exemption expires in 2001.
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TAA convention fee
at $125
NEW ORLEANS, Louisiana,
February 15, 2000 -- Early-bird registration for Text and Academic Authors'
national convention will be $145 for members who sign up by May , then
$150, said Ron Pynn, executive director. Registration includes the Saturday
night awards banquet. For non-TAA members, the early registration fee,
until May 1, is $195, then $245. Pynn said the registration fee is in
line with previous conventions, albeit an experiment in 1999 to test
whether a lower fee would attract more members. The experiment, at park
City, Utah, found that attendance is unrelated to registration fees.
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TAA leader: Consider
a certification program
CINCINNATI, Ohio,
February 16, 2000 -- A certification program for companies that provide
author services should be considered by Text and Academic Authors, said
TAA Council member Steve Gillen in a recommendation. Gillen likened
a TAA imprimatur to certification programs operated by Underwriting
Laboratories and Good Housekeeping magazine. Short-run publishers,
internet publishers, literary agents, independent editors and consultants,
and other service providers could apply, he said: "There is certainly
no shortage of fly-by-night custom publishers, agents and book doctors.
At the same time, there are many capable service providers who can and
do render valuable services for fair compensation. We could do our members
a great service by helping them tell one from the other and by using
our collective strength to help negotiate favorable terms and treatment
for TAA members."
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MORRIS: "A model"
TAA president lauds new Northern Kentucky policy
ROCHESTER, New York,
February 17, 2000 -- The president of Text and Academic Authors, Karen
Morris, is pleased that Northern Kentucky University faculty are happy
with the university's new policy on authoring royalties. "It could serve
as a model for many schools," Morris said. With two exceptions, the
policy recognizes that royalty royalties belongs 100 percent to professors.
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R.I.P. Walter Thurston
Oakley
Walter Thurston
Oakley, former sales vice president at Oxford University Press, later
sales director at W.W. Norton, died February 25 after a brief illness.
He was 86.
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PROFIT LOSS
Educational Insights:
Sales rose 21 percent to $39.2 million in the latest year.
Thomas Nelson: Sales
dropped slightly to $191.5 for the latest three quarters, compared to
a year earlier.
Scholastic: Sales
in the first half rose 24.3 percent to $687.8 million, compared to a
year earlier.
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TAA focuses Council
of Fellows criteria
TWIN FALLS, Idaho,
February 21, 2000 -- More specific criteria will be used to choose authors
for Text and Academic Authors' prestigious Council of Fellows next year,
said nominations chair Peggy Stanfield. "To level the playing field,"
she said, "we want to give each nominee the opportunity to speak to
the same issues," she said. The new criteria: A sustained and robust
writing career over time, including numerous publications and well-received
texts evidenced by multiple editions and possibly awards. This year,
two authors will become Fellows. The committee reviewed 12 nominations.
"The committee was unable to reach a consensus on the others, since
they each had special attributes," Stanfield said. She hoped they would
be nominated again next year.
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Newsletter talks
with TAA founder
WINONA, Minnesota,
February 21, 2000 -- The March issue of the Academic Author,
to be mailed to Text and Academic Authors members at the end of the
month, features TAA founder Mike Keedy in the Notable Author series.
Keedy, a pilot, equates writing a textbook to teaching someone how to
fly. Both are step-by-step processes. The interview, abbreviated in
the newsletter, was conducted by Kim Pawlak. The complete version is
on-line.
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Wisconsin Press
making turn-around strides
MADISON, Wisconsin,
February 21, 2000 -- A shift toward trade books seems to have improved
University of Wisconsin Press fiscal prospects. Interim director David
Bethea said the fall list was "tremendously successful." A turn-around
strategy has included emphasizing trade books, phasing out anthropology
titles, and laying off five staff members. Before any changes were implemented,
the Press had accumulated a $1 million deficit.
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New search engine
seeks textbook sites
WAKEFIELD, Massachusetts,
February 21, 2000 -- A search engine that scours the web for textbook
sites, Textbookhound.com, was launched by Impulse Communications.
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New Orleans program
chair seeks TAA Council seat
TWIN FALLS, Idaho,
Florida, February 21, 2000 -- A photojournalist who free-lanced for
Time, Newsweek, the New York Times and other publications, and who ended
up in academe teaching and writing about visual communication, is on
the spring ballot for the TAA Council. Chris Harris, of Middle Tennessee
State University, is program chair for the association's June convention
in New Orleans. Harris and Paul Martin Lester recently completed Visual
Reporting, due soon from Allyn & Bacon. TAA nominations chair Peggy
Stanfield announced Harris' place on the ballot.
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Med texts faulted
on death
SAN FRANCISCO, California,
February 22, 2000 -- Med-school textbooks are lacking on material on
the end of patients' lives, researchers at the University of California
San Francisco concluded. The conclusion fits well with accrediting agencies
that have encouraged more physician training in the care of dying patients.
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Copyright expert:
How to acquire visuals legally
NEW ORLEANS, Louisiana,
February 22, 2000 -- The Copyright Clearance Center's chief for the
MIRA on-line photographs and illustrations service, Kristen Giordano,
will serve on a panel on how to gather copyrighted materials for use
in a publication at the Text and Academic Authors national convention
in New Orleans in June. During her portion of the presentation, "Assembling
All the Parts for Publication, Including Visuals," Giordano will demonstrate
how authors can legally obtain Media Image Resource Alliance images
for textbooks. "As authors, I know, they are all acutely aware of copyright
compliance and our product allows them to search an archive of over
60,000 images, price them and purchase them all on-line," Giordano said.
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College stores keep
pressure of dot-com claims
OBERLIN, Ohio, February
22, 2000 -- The National Association of College Stores, which has sued
VarsityBooks.com for ads claiming 40 percent discounts on web textbook
purchases, served notice on two other dot-coms to tone down their claims.
Attorney Marc Fleischaker said an ongoing NACS investigation has identified
excessive claims by BigWords.com and eCampus.com. Fleischaker's message:
Substantiate the claims or drop them. What are the claims:
- BigWord.com:
40 percent discount on top 40 textbooks.
- eCampus.com:
50 percent discount on top 50 textbooks.
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Wolters Kluwer buys
Genesis med publisher
MONTCLAIR, New Jersey,
February 22, 2000 -- The Genesis Group, which publishes pharmaceutical
and other medical literature, has been acquired by Wolters Kluwer of
Europe. Genesis will be folded into Kluwer's Adis International subsidiary
in Philadelphia. Terms were not announced.
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Thomson puts newspapers
on block -- except one
TORONTO, Ontario,
February 22, 2000 -- The Thomson media conglomerate is looking for a
buyer of all of its 130 remaining newspapers in Canada and the United
States -- except the Toronto Globe Mail, which Thomson has positioned
as a national newspaper. The bulk of the sell-off: 54 dailies with a
total of 1.3 million circulation. The Thomson decision continues a newspaper
sell-off to raise funds for more Internet-based information services.
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Text, academic sales
grew in 1999
WASHINGTON, February
22, 2000 -- All book genres in which text and academic authors publish
scored sales gains in 1999, the Association of American Publishers reported.
These included 8.3 percent growth in college sales and 5.1 percent for
university presses. Overall, the book industry sales rose 4.3 percent
to $24.0 billion.
1999 TEXTBOOK
AND ACADEMIC BOOK SALES
From Association of American Publishers compilations
|
| College |
$3.1 billion |
+ 8.3 percent |
| El-hi adoptions |
$3.4 billion |
+ 3.0 percent |
| University press |
$411.7 million |
+ 5.1 percent |
| STM and business |
$788.9 million |
+ 2.8 percent |
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Thomson plans custom
publishing on-line
BELMONT, California,
February 22, 2000 -- Thomson Learning, whose properties include South-Western,
West, Delmar and Wadsworth, is launching a custom printing operation
called E-riginality. Launch target: June. In a message to professors,
Thomson said, "E-riginality' is your opportunity to have published the
course materials you've uniquely authored. We put our sales team, expertise
and industry strengths behind your product and handle everything from
marketing to production and publishing." The materials go on the internet
so professors can view them for adoption as stand-alones or course-packs.
E-riginality also will publish out- of-print books, the company said.
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TAA committee to
examine imprimatur idea
ROCHESTER, New York,
February 22, 2000 -- A committee will be formed to examine whether Text
and Academic Authors should install a seal-of-approval program for companies
and individuals offering services to authors, said TAA President Karen
Morris. The committee will review a proposal by Steve Gillen, a TAA
Council member. Gillen suggested a TAA imprimatur for service providers
that submit to a review and agree to maintain certain standards.
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FULL TEXT: TAA certification
proposal
CINCINNATI, Ohio,
February 22, 2000 -- These are key parts of a recommendation of Steve
Gillen, TAA Council member, on establishing a certification program
for companies and individuals offering services to authors:
"TAA might consider
... the establishment of a certification program for short-run publishers,
internet publishers, literary agents, and other service providers (independent
editors and consultants). The certification program would not be unlike
those administered by Underwriters Laboratories and Good Housekeeping.
"There is certainly
no shortage of fly-by-night custom publishers, agents, and book doctors
ready, willing, and able to take advantage of naive, and sometimes desperate,
authors. At the same time, there are many capable service providers
who can and do render valuable services for fair compensation. We could
do our members a great service by helping them tell one from the other
and by using our collective strength to help negotiate favorable terms
and treatment for TAA members. Publishers
Marketing Association provides a similar vendor-evaluation service
for its independent-publisher members.
"Under this scenario,
TAA would investigate and evaluate those wishing to be included in a
directory of TAA-approved service providers. Applicants would have to
submit to a due diligence review, agree to maintain certain minimum
standards and terms, perhaps agree to offer favorable terms to TAA members,
and pay a fee to cover the cost of investigation and maintenance and
for the right to carry a TAA certification mark and be listed in the
TAA directory.
"The directory would
be available only to TAA members, but the certification mark could be
used by approved service providers in their advertising and promotional
material.
"TAA would develop
an investigation/due diligence checklist and certain minimum standards
for each type of service provider. For a short-run publisher, the inquiry
might include the following topics:
Financial Stability
a. Review of financial
statements
b. Review of credit and D&B reports
c. Determination of adequate capitalization
Track Record
a. List of titles
b. List of authors
c. Samples of publications
d. Report showing time-to-market, by title
e. Samples of promotional and marketing materials
f. List and description of marketing channels and volume in each
g. Total units sold/royalties paid, by title
h. Sales against former edition i. Reference check
Evaluation of
Standard Terms
a. Review of standard
contracts for fairness
Negotiation of
Favorable Terms for TAA Members
a. Minimum royalty
rates
b. Minimum standards for certain other terms
c. Detailed sales/royalty reporting requirement and a clear audit
right
"TAA might also
serve as a clearing house for complaints/compliments (as PMA has done
through its on-line survey).
"Next Steps
"If you think that
any of the foregoing merits additional attention, I suggest that Karen
Morris appoint a small ad hoc committee to work with Ron for the purpose
of evaluating each or all, that said committee meet by telephone conference
(as often as necessary) between now and the June Council meeting to
conduct their evaluation, and that they prepare and present a concrete
plan of action for review, discussion, and approval at the Council meeting."
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Marxist editor leaves
Monthly Review
NEW YORK, February
23, 2000 -- The heir apparent at the Marxist Monthly Review,
Ellen Meiksins Wood, resigned. Wood said she told friends she was ousted,
apparently in a disagreement with co-editor Harry Magdoff on a submission
on monopoly capitalism by Oregon sociologist John Bellamy Foster. Magdoff
explained Wood's departure as "purely an internal matter" and wouldn't
elaborate.
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