Just a year ago, most parents chose independently which ebooks their children read. Now those decisions are split nearly evenly between parents and kids, according to a new reportpublished today by PlayCollective and Digital Book World.
The expanded roles children are now playing as consumers of digital content present publishers with new challenges and opportunities.
While more children are now primary owners of e-reading devices, a circumstance that PlayCollective finds drives e-reading itself, ebooks must now compete for kids’ attention with a battery of other media on those very same devices.
And around age eleven, reading begins losing ground to other activities like games and apps.
Opinion is split as to how publishers should respond, but what’s seems clear is that the goal will increasingly move toward attracting children first and their parents second.
To get all the ebook and digital publishing news you need every day in your inbox at 8:00 AM, sign up for the DBW Daily today!
Macmillan Enters a Changing Subscription Ebook Market (DBW) Adding 1,000 back-list titles each to Oyster and Scribd, Macmillan wades into a subscription landscape that’s evolved dramatically over the past eight months. Scribd now claims it’s the third biggest revenue source for some publishers, even though Oyster’s catalog now boasts twice as many titles.
Penguin Publishing Group Reshuffles Upper Ranks (Pub Lunch) Madeline McIntosh, president of the freshly established Penguin Publishing Group, institutes major changes in the division, merging the Dutton and Putnam imprints, accompanied by a number of top-level appointments.
What Trade Publishers Can Learn from the STM Market (DBW) Science, technology and medicine (STM) publishers may not publish the most glamorous titles in the book business, but major players in the sector have different ways of operating than their trade counterparts, which occasionally seeds more collaboration. Here’s one industry insider’s take.
Remarkably, Little to Remark on Ebook Best-Seller List (DBW) We’ve seen few long, multi-week runs at No. 1 ever since mega-hits like Divergent or The Fault in Our Stars swept the rankings in the middle of last year. Since then, average prices have skittered up and down, and this week’s uptick is no exception to that variability. Somewhat remarkably, though, few titles moved very far out of the positions they occupied last week.
How Will Reader Data Impact Readers? (NYRB) Publishers may welcome the expanding opportunities to gather insights about ebook readers, but one observer points out more readers may begin to turn away from publishers and retailers that scrutinize and parse their every move.
UK Publishers Collaborate on New Digital Imprint (Teleread) Two former Quercus executives partner with the digital head of Profile Books to launch Canelo, a UK-based digital publisher focusing on ebooks, apps and web-based fiction and nonfiction.
The public library system Director Mary Jean Jakubowski said the more books a person reads, and the more reviews they write, the higher their chances are of getting a prize. The grand prize will be a Kindle Fire HDX eReader.
Marcus Folingo, left guard for the Buffalo Sabres, told kids he loved reading when he wasn’t on his skates as a kid. He said he loved reading and learning about the world around him.
Peter is very interested in Minecraft and is always willing to help somebody else out regardless how it affects him. Peter sits with his grandfather every morning and reads the newspaper.
What is your favorite thing about Minecraft?
The main thing about Minecraft on my XBox 360 is building houses and small villages for my brother. I am a true artist.
What other games do you like to play?
I like to play Rango on my XBox 360. In this game, I am a lizard and I fight off the bad brutes and henchmen, people who are “wanted” by the sheriff’s posse. I also play Quantum 007.
You have a special bond with your Grandpa, what do you enjoy doing with him?
My grandpa is always happy and he loves me with all of his heart. He makes my lunch and he treats me to toys when I do my chores and behave appropriately. My grandparents are very special to me.
Do you know what you want to be when you grow up?
I would like to be a teacher like Ms. Matie. I think I want to teach the big kids because I can teach them everything they need to know.
What do you like most about your school?
I like that we go to recess, sometimes I get to help Mrs. Nahrgang and I love my teacher Ms. Matie.
Minecraft is building itself a record-breaking reputation.
You’ll see it’s true for yourself if you read the Guinness World Records 2015 Gamer’s Edition. The block-building and survival-based sandbox game (which is out on just about every non-Nintendo platform imaginable) has tons of records listed in the book, including:
Best-selling indie game: Total PC and Mac sales for Minecraft are at 16,176,201. Not bad for a studio with just 40 employees.
Largest indie game convention: 7,500 people attended MineCon 2013 at the Orange County Convention Center in Orlando, Fla., on Nov. 2 to Nov. 3, 2013. That’s a lot of people to gather for an event dedicated to just one game.
First country modeled at full-scale in a video game: That would be Denmark, which the Danish Geodata Agency re-created in Minecraft to 1-to-1 scale.
Most popular game beta: Minecraft’s beta had more than 10 million participants when it was active from Dec. 20, 2010 to Nov. 18, 2011
Most-played Xbox Live game: Players of Minecraft: Xbox 360 Edition had spent a total of 1.75 billion hours as of May 2014.
The book also includes Minecraft-specific records, like “most concurrent players in one Minecraft world.” The Guinness World Records 2015 Gamer’s Edition is out now for $15.
The New Nintendo 3DS (yes, that’s really the name), includes a long list of new features, including an analog nub, additional ZL and ZR shoulder buttons, improved 3D, integrated NFC support for Amiibo, a faster CPU, and replaceable cover plates.
For lots more on the New Nintendo 3DS, check out the video above.
Today’s New Nintendo 3DS release date rumor comes less than a day before Nintendo is scheduled to hold its latest Nintendo Direct video briefing. In announcing the event last night, Nintendo said the focus of the event would be spring 2015 Wii U and 3DS games, though of course this doesn’t rule out discussion of other topics, likely potentially the New Nintendo 3DS launch date.
Tomorrow’s Nintendo Direct kicks off at 6 AM Pacific / 9 AM Eastern / 2 PM UK. We’ll post the livestream info tomorrow, and we’ll have all the news for you as it’s announced.
