Nice article. Let me quote the parts I've found more interesting:
Quote:
Last week, as the title arrived at number four on Amazon's bestseller chart, Brown's American publishers, Knopf DoubleDay, announced that an ebook of the title, to be downloaded and read on screen, will be released simultaneously. With more than 81m copies of The Da Vinci Code sold across the world, industry hopes for the transformative power of this new title may be justified.
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Rickett said he published an ebook simultaneously with all his titles and that this was linked to new online marketing strategies.
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The technology that allows readers to read books on a handheld screen is improving just at the moment Brown's The Lost Symbol hits the streets. For Rickett, the possibilities, including books with scored soundtracks and video inserts, are just becoming clear.
"The ebook is very quickly becoming a publishing reality and The Lost Symbol will be one of the fastest-selling books of recent times," he said. "Once people can flip between books, look up references online and switch to an audio reading, everything will change very quickly."
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Some American authors, particular in the crime and the business genres, already sell a third of their copies as ebooks. But, although the new Brown title will be a huge publicity boost for the ebook, the industry knows that by far the biggest readership will be on paper.
Will this translate into wider sales for other printed books? "Pretty soon, rival book stores will start discounting editions to draw people in. It can't help but rub off to some degree," said Rickett.
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