More BEA digestion
I was a little concerned on Friday morning; it did not seem that crowded at Javits. I did my walkabout, wondering where everybody was. Over the course of the day, the place gradually filled up and by Saturday things were hopping.
Hopping being a relative term. A number of publishers declined to have booths altogether - Random House held a series of meetings in the basement of Javits - and other booths were shadows of their former selves. I didn't see much in the way of tchotchkes - giveaways came in the form of not-quite-canvas bags. As for crazy characters - a smattering of Storm Troopers, a pirate, and a couple of babes in bikinis. Not so outrageous.
Some increases: the number of self-published authors with a booth - usually promoting a single title. I don't know who advised this, but it doesn't seem like a brilliant way to spend money. There was an entire "Writers Row" - this was not well-attended and I really felt that these authors were not getting their money's worth out of the show. (More on that on my Authorweb blog.)
The publishing world decided to throw a bone to innovation by offering up a blogger space - which was depressing, poorly-lit, and (until Sunday) without any internet connectivity. This was in the same row as the booths for the various ebook readers and their suppliers - tiny booths, tucked away behind the Borders booth. It was hard not to regard this area as being for those that the industry wished would just go away so everything could go back to the way it had always been.
Highlights: Richard Nash gave a brilliant talk on the direction publishing is going. He's got a new venture called Round Table - a new model altogether that invites the community into the writing of a book. Brian O'Leary presented his findings to date on his piracy project - and a call for more participation by publishers so his data will be more robust. Mike Shatzkin called for more focus on community and "going vertical". Bowker presented some very compelling data from its PubTrack Consumer market research. Tina Brown's CEO Roundtable was extremely well-attended - although she lost her voice early on and had to be replaced by her husand, Sir Harold Evans. Michael Cader moderated a session on Google Book Search that proved a bit controversial (he covers that in Publishers Lunch). Sessions with Chris Brogan and Chris Anderson generated a lot of buzz.
Another couple of highlights: Firebrand's "blogger signing" events, with prominent book bloggers signing trading cards or printouts of their blog's homepage. And of course the BEA Tweetup (#beatweetup) arranged almost entirely on Twitter.
Clearly an industry in transition and not happy about it!
What I offer:
