Friday, September 18, 2009

Google Signs Deal With The EBM

There was an article in eWeek yesterday about the Espresso Book Machine (EBM) signing an agreement with Google whereby Google will provide the digitized files on two million books in the public domain to On Demand Books (the parent company of the EBM) for printing and sale.

According to eWeek:
Google Books titles offered via the Espresso Machine will have a recommended sales price of $8 per copy, though the price is subject to change by retailers. On Demand may have access to sell more works if Google's Book Search deal with authors and publishers passes muster with the New York District Court in October.
I was most interested in the economics of the deal. The article says that the Espresso Book Machine is available for sale to publishers, libraries and retailers for $75,000 and can produce a professional-quality paperback with a full-color paperback cover in about five to ten minutes.

The Associated Press claims the EBM sells for $100,000 and that On Demand Books and Google will each get about a $1 from a book sale. Google has announced it will donate its proceeds to charities and other nonprofit causes.

Either way, the price of the machines are coming down. When the University of Alberta Bookstore installed its EBM on November 1, 2007, the price was $144,000.

The AP says:
On Demand's printing machines already are in more than a dozen locations in the United States, Canada, Australia, England and Egypt, mostly at campus book stores, libraries and small retailers. The Harvard Book Store will be among the first already equipped with an instant-publishing machine to have access to Google's digital library.
Go here to read the eWeek article.

Go here to read the AP story in the New York Daily News.

3 comments:

K.M. Saint James said...

So, do you think this is the wave of the future? Should we be cheering? Or holding our collective writing breath?

Maya Reynolds said...

Sandra: I'll answer that question in my Tuesday post (Monday's is already written).

Best,

Maya

omers said...

Hi Maya really liked your article, it was written in a very informative way, nice and simple :)
You are more than welcome to read my post about the subject in The CEO Game .