Free the galley slaves! Sony-Adobe pact will help pubs shift from paper galleys to the E variety, via NetGalley-style companies
Hundreds of galleys go out just to promote a typical new book from a large publisher.
Bestsellers may require thousands. And expenses can add up. What’s more, consider the burden on small houses.
So I was happy to see—buried in a content-related announcement from Sony—word of an alliance with a little company called NetGalley. Book reviewers with Sony Readers will be able to download Reader-friendly PDFs from NetGalley.
DRM will be an option for NetGalley’s publisher clients. Because advance reading copies often reach reviewers months ahead of publication, publishers are often extra-security-minded. In time I’d love for ePub and perhaps social DRM to predominate, but the current arrangement is a start, since traditional DRM is just an option even now. NetGalley is to offer ePub in the fall with a similar choice.
Issues remain to be worked out. Just who will pay for the Sony readers, for example? Will reviewers compromise themselves if they accept the readers from publishers or even groups of publishers?
Would a professional reviewers’ group be a better conduit for equipment? Or would that create yet more problems, especially since so many accomplished amateurs are among today’s reviewers? Of course the real solution would be for the cost of readers to drop to the point where reviewers can simply buy their own.
Yet another issue, some argue, might be that some books with long sentences and paragraphs are simply better experienced on paper.
Revolve around just one company?
Still another question will be how much of the proofing operation should revolve around one company. Just how open will this progress be? That said, I know and am professional friends with the people involved (NetGalley founder Ted Treanor is a TeleRead contributor, for example, as is Kat Meyer, who helps writes a blog for the company), and from all indications they are top-rate.
The market will make the ultimate call on this one. If nothing else, publishers can always send e-galleys directly to reviewers without any company involved. NetGalley-style companies will simply make this more convenient, with fewer technical hassles, and of course they can build online communities to help whet interest in individual books. Here’s a full tour of NetGalley.
For now, the big challenge is simply to effect the transition from paper to E. Best of luck to all involved. The more publishers and reviewers rely an e-books to do their own jobs, the more open-minded they will be about E for the public at large.
More details from NetGalley: “Nearly 40 publishers are experimenting with NetGalley as a way to invite contacts to view galleys digitally. Publishers can also place their titles in NetGalley’s catalog and allow the growing community of reviewers, bloggers, media, booksellers, librarians and educators to request digital galleys.
“In addition to the Sony Reader, NetGalley users can also download galleys as protected PDFs on their computers, view them with NetGalley’s proprietary Online Reader, have a PDF emailed to their Kindle, or request a printed galley. Reading options are selected by the publisher.”
Related: NetGalley’s Fran Toolan on the Sony announcement.
August 26th, 2009 at 9:40 am
This is one of the few (if not the only) cases in which I would consider DRM as something logical and desirable.