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What is licensing and how do publishers do it?

Today on the People’s Guide to Publishing podcast, Joe and Elly tackle the topic of licensing. This is the key business concept for any publisher to understand and consider. Licensing is sort of the engine fuel that makes the industry and your piece of it work; publishers license work from authors to put out as books and then sometimes go on to license different editions and formats. Here it is broken down in a way that will help you see your part in that ecosystem a little more clearly.

This one is part of a 3-part series – you can also check out our episode from last week on intellectual property.

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What is an “Indie Author”?

This week on the People’s Guide to Publishing podcast / vlogcast, Joe and Elly consider the term “indie author” and how various forces have tried to co-opt the meaning of independence when it comes to writing and creative work. No punches are pulled as we encourage you to think critically about what you value about independence and whether or not you actually are getting that from the company selling it to you.

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What We Learned at the Las Vegas Market Gift Show

This week on the People’s Guide to Publishing podcast, Joe and Elly report back from Las Vegas Market—a giant trade show for the gift market. We talk about what “gift” means, why book publishers might attend such an event, what it was like, and some of the logistics and costs involved. Not mentioned, but deserving of a shout-out are Vegas’s bikeshare system and Tacotarian, two discoveries that turned our trip from a slog to a delight.

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An interview with Women on Wheels author April Streeter

This week on the podcast, we invite a guest into our studio for the first time in almost two years! April Streeter, author of the new feminist bicycle history Women on Wheels, joined us to talk about the untold histories of women cyclists since the 1880s, share fascinating tidbits of archival research and costumery, and revisit a bit of shop talk about what it was like to publish with us (and how we handled all those amazing illustrations).

You can find this and over 100 other episodes of the People’s Guide to Publishing podcast wherever podcasts are served.

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How Can Publishers Provide Health Care?

Publishing jobs are real jobs! On this episode of the People’s Guide to Publishing podcast, Joe and Elly talk about one of Microcosm’s biggest steps towards becoming a grown-up company—providing our workers with health insurance. The healthcare system is not easy to figure out, but the good news is that experience in the publishing industry really sets you up to handle with aplomb the piles of mystifying paperwork, strict schedules and rules, and contracts that need to be read super closely.

Should Publishers Try to Compete with Amazon on Price?

This week on the People’s Guide to Publishing podcast, Joe and Elly answer a reader question from a bookseller wondering if they should try to match the prices in their store to the prices they find online, which are often much lower (but sometimes much higher) than the cover price.

Of course we legally can’t advise any publishers on how to price their books, and we don’t do that here, but we do discuss some strategies and perspectives for managing your business in a market where price is problematic.

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