From The Bookseller:
An unprecedented wave of new-media players are descending on the London Book Fair, triggering a “dramatic explosion” in book-to-film/TV and audio deals.
Hannah Griffiths, head of literary acquisitions at production company All3Media, said the “exponential growth” in hours of airtime, owing to the rise of streaming platforms such as Netflix and Amazon Prime, marked an “optimistic moment” for the trade. She added: “It’s like if five major dedicated book chains opened up in Britain tomorrow, each needing to fill the shelves… and with loads of money to spend on stock.”
. . . .
Katie McCalmont, Netflix’s literary scout in the UK at Maria B Campbell Associates, said the number of new-media buyers had gone up “big time”, in tandem with “a blurring of boundaries” between different media. She said the climate was “a huge opportunity” for publishers and agents.
Link to the rest at The Bookseller
“It’s like if five major dedicated book chains opened up in Britain tomorrow, each needing to fill the shelves… and with loads of money to spend on stock.”
Umm, I don’t think she quite gets how this works. More TV/Streaming/Whatever channels usually means a need for more new programming, yes. (The exceptions are the channels that mainly show reruns — they’re like used bookstores. 🙂 ) But bookstores don’t work that way. A new chain bookstore opening up, or even five new chain bookstores, doesn’t mean the big publishers are going to suddenly find they can publish an extra five or ten thousand books per year and flourish. Most chain bookstores carry essentially the same stock. Smaller stores will carry a subset of the stock of a larger store, but there’s not really a huge difference between what a B&N carries and what a Bookstar carries.
More stores mean printing more copies of the books you publish, but not necessarily publishing all that many more titles.
TV/etc. channels operate on a completely different business model from that of bookstores, and it’s startling that someone involved in this industry doesn’t get that. :/
Angie
maybe this is why oddly, weve been approached suddenly and I do mean off the wall, by three agenting for film companies in the last week, asking after some of our books. The answer was no, but it was nice to be asked I suppose. Again.
It’s a reallysmarmy business, and theyhead for the hills when you sayyou will reserve all creative control. lol
Amazing. Completely ignores writers in favor of publishers and…AGENTS…
Writers come and go but publishers abd agents will always be around to feed THE BOOKSELLER.
A huge opportunity to embezzle a few extra quid which the writer wasn’t going to notice anyway.
Wouldn’t it be good if it was a “huge opportunity” for authors and not the middlemen?
They need to learn to stop selling the cow and just sell the milk, it pays better in the long run.