A Dash of the Magical

As a newly minted member of the Livres Canada Books team, I tripped to Toronto to attend BookNet Canada’s Technology Forum on March 25th.  The theme of the day was Calculated Risk: Adventures in Publishing, but the event was perhaps more appropriately dubbed “a gathering of beautiful nerds” by Richard Nash of Cursor Books.

So, what kind of insight was gleaned in a room full of publishing geeks? 

The dominant prescription from BookNet Canada’s speakers was for publishers to embrace new and experimental ways of doing business.  However, the real revelation came from Michael Tamblyn of Kobo, and not just in his announcement that Kobo will launch an e-reader imminently.  Tamblyn gave a compelling view of lessons learned over the last year in the Shortcovers experiment, and implored others to move fast; to recognize when something just isn’t working and change direction as quickly as possible. 

Sourcebooks founder Dominique Raccah, whose infectious energy permeated the room, echoed Tambyn by dishing on successful digital ventures and experiments-gone-wrong.  As a pioneering publisher of ebooks with titles frequently topping the bestseller lists, Raccah has been able to produce great digital products simply because she leaves herself, and her company, open to the element of surprise.  It was refreshing to find a dash of the magical amid the meta and the data.  Check out PoetrySpeaks.com to get a glimpse at the kind of thing Sourcebooks is doing.

Finally, one of the more rousing talks of the day was delivered by Deanna McFadden of HarperCollins Canada.  Deanna credited HarperCollins with giving her the latitude to take new and uncharted paths in her role as Online Content and Strategy manager, and gave great advice to publishers building online communities.  She mused about the horror of Facebook - “no one does anything on Facebook except be on Facebook” - and the glory of top 10 lists, which she highly recommends using on a web site or blog.  But Deanna’s most hilarious observation was that “the novel died again last week for the 27th time.”  This was simultaneously sobering, bringing everyone’s heads out of the ether to prove that now, more than ever, it’s all about the book. 

Congratulations to BookNet Canada on their success.  To view the presentations from these speakers and others, visit http://www.booknetcanada.ca.

Tricia McCraney | 04/13/2010 | Digital

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