What would you like to know about digital licensing but never dared ask?
SCROLL DOWN for short Video Briefings explaining how to avoid some of the pitfalls in digital rights.

Re-using images from the web: a risky business?

Isn’t it all about apps?
 

4 types of ebook
 

‘Best terms’ in digital agreements

Licensing content for use on a website

E-book rights for translations

 

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Video transcriptions

Isn’t it all about apps?

Hello, I’m Clare Painter.

I’m often asked by publishers about apps.  Every publisher should be creating them,
shouldn’t they?

Well, perhaps.
Certainly apps can provide a rich and interactive experience for the
user, much more so than an ebook can do.
However, there is quite a high cost to developing them and the cost that
you can charge for those apps is not necessarily going to be very high.

The best apps perhaps are those which are really story led -
if you like, a high tech version of the book.
But the marketplace for apps is very crowded and at times it can seem
quite disorganized.  So the apps that
achieve high sales are often really the ones that have really specific support,
where there’s a particular active partnership between the publisher and the
store where the apps are being sold.

And for apps, brand is often key.  If you have a strong brand, you’re much more
likely to be able to have a successful app because it will be noticed and it
will be found.

4 types of ebook

Hello, I’m Clare Painter and I wanted to talk to you today
about the four principal types of ebook which are being used at the moment.

The first one, of course, is the straightforward ebook;
usually text only, in a single column.
You might have a few illustrations but they would follow set rules, so
they’re not too complicated.

The second sort is the reflowed ebook.  This is where it’s a bit more complicated and
you may need some designer editorial work to go on before you convert it into
whichever format you’re going to use.
The classic one, of course, would be EPUB for this.  The text and the layout would reflow
according to the size of the screen that’s being used.

The third sort is the original ebook and this is really new
combinations of content.  So you’re
creating an ebook which probably has no physical equivalent.  This is where you can be a bit creative I
think.  It might be shortened text; you
might have text without the illustrations; or you might have something like the
first chapters from a number of different books.  There’s a number of ways that you can use
that.  And that’s often used either as a
free giveaway, a sample, or perhaps as a low cost taster.

And the fourth type of ebook is the enhanced ebook.  This is where you’re adding video, audio, web
links; whatever you like really.  But I would
sound a note of caution: simply to select that material carefully.  All that material that you add in to an
enhanced ebook adds to the cost but it needs also to enrich the experience for
the reader or the user of that ebook.
You will be able to increase prices probably for any enhanced ebook
compared to any straightforward ebook but it’s very easy to let those costs run
away.  You can end up spending huge
amounts of money and not necessarily be able to recoup that in the price that
you’re able to charge.

So the four types of ebook that we’ve looked at are the
straightforward ebook, the reflowed (reflowable) ebook, original ebooks and
enhanced ebooks.

 

Best terms in digital agreements

Hello, I’m Clare Painter and I have a question for
publishers who are licensing and distributing their ebooks.

Have you come across a Competing Terms Clause yet?  If not, you may come across it quite soon
because these are being used more and more frequently.  This is a clause which says that you, as
publisher, must offer this particular digital partner your best terms.

It might talk about similar companies in the same market;
setting up a level playing field.
Sometimes it’s even referred to as the Most Favoured Nation Clause.

Now everything depends, of course, on exactly which terms we
are talking about; and they can vary.  It
may mean that the sales price to the end consumer has to be the best possible;
the lowest possible.  Or it may mean that
the discount must be the best.  You have
to offer this partner your best, or highest, discount.

In the end, of course, what this means is that it’s up to
you, as publisher, to determine which business models are competing with one
another; which services are competing with one another; which ones are exactly
in the same market.  And yet you can’t
discuss this openly in any detail because that would mean breaching
confidentiality with one licensee or another.

Now I suspect that the legal situation for clauses such as
these may be different in different parts of the world but what you, as
publishers, need to consider is the practicality of it.  How exactly are you going to comply with
clauses like these?  Not just on the day
when you sign the contract, but actually over the whole life of the agreement
and bearing in mind that you may have different contracts, containing different
clauses, all of which require you to comply in a slightly different way.

See you next time.

 

Licensing Content For Use On A Website

Hello, I’m Clare Painter and I’d like to talk about
licensing for use on a website.

Very often publishers are approached by potential licensees,
who say, “We’ve seen this or that title in your catalogue; we think it’s
particularly suitable for us; we’d like to put it on our website.  How much does it cost?”

Now, before you get too much into the detail of exactly how
long the licence might be and exactly what they might pay, I would suggest that
there are some more details that you, as publishers, would want to find out
before you can do that.

The first thing I would want to establish is, what exactly
do they mean by “website”?  Do they
literally mean a website on the internet that’s free and open to
everybody?  Can anybody and everybody
access this material with no charge?

Or are they actually thinking of some sort of closed
system?  Perhaps a subscription site or a
membership site?  Perhaps an intranet
within their organization?  All those are
very different in terms of licensing.

Secondly, do they want to use the full material from this particular
title?  Now that may be what they want to
do; it may well be what they’re thinking of but, depending on the topic and the
subject area, it’s possible that maybe part of that title might be sufficient;
maybe a section or a chapter.

So for you, as publishers, you need to not only think about
what the licensee is proposing to you but also how users are going to be
accessing that material.  Will they able
to browse the entire title and perhaps read it through from the beginning;
straight through, right to the end, if that’s how they chose to look at
it?  Or will they be presented with it in
some other way?  Perhaps with a search
box, for example, so they get taken to a relevant chunk of the text, depending
on what they search for?

Bear in mind that, if the material is given away for free,
then you’re unlikely to be able to come up with other commercial licences for
that same material in the future, even if you’re being paid a fee.  In other words, if the licensee is paying you
a fee but the user is able to go in and look at that material without paying
any charge at all, then you’re not very likely to get fees from other people,
who would pay you other fees.  So that’s
something you should definitely bear in mind.

So, if you’re approached with a query of this sort from
someone who wants to put one of your titles up on their website, my suggestion
is that you dig a little bit further and find out a little bit more about
exactly what it is that they want to do and what they will be offering to the
people who come to their website.

 

Ebook rights for translations

Hello, I’m Clare Painter and I’d like to talk about ebook
rights in translations.

I believe that this is something that’s happening more and
more frequently.  Publishers who are
licensing translation rights, as many, many do of course, are being asked, by
their translation partners, to include ebook rights in that translation deal.

Now, publishers are concerned about what terms they should
agree to in that situation, of course, but they’re also concerned, in some
cases, as to whether they should be agreeing to these licences at all.  Now, if you’re in that situation, I suggest
that the first thing you want to establish is whether the translation publisher
is already actively selling ebooks.  They
may well be, of course, but they may not.
They may be accumulating rights for the future and, if that’s the case,
it may be more appropriate to offer them perhaps an option and invite them to
come back to you when their plans are a little bit more advanced.

Assuming that they are selling ebooks already; how are they
doing that?  Is it entirely through their
own website?  Would you have to go to the
publisher’s own website and buy a copy of an ebook there?  Or is the publisher also working with other
intermediaries?  Are they working with
distributors and aggregators and all sorts of other licensees in order to make
those titles available to a wider public?

Are they providing titles in one format or in multiple
formats?  Are they being provided in such
a way that they could work on ebook readers or on tablets, like the iPad, as
well as on the larger computer screen, if you like?

Really, what I suppose I am saying is you should compare it
to your own ebook plans and the sorts of things that you are already doing in
your own ebook strategy.

There’s an awful lot more to say about this topic but I hope
that……