Publishing Blog
Notes from Beirut where the media is under threat
by Lina Chebaro
Lina Chebaro, who lives in Beirut, was caught in the explosion which devastated the Lebanese city on 4 August 2020. In this blog post, MA student Lina reflects on the unfolding situation in Lebanon, and the threats faced by publishers and journalists in the region.
Edited by .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address) on 06 Oct 2020 around 7am
Accessibility: Is Publishing Doing Enough?
by Caroline Guillet
Aside from discussions around diversity and inclusivity, the industry is also expected to be as accessible as possible, on both the product and people side. Bill Kasdorf, Simon Holt, Ruth Wells and Erin Osborne Martin joined forces during OPUS’ latest panel event to discuss accessible content and workplace in publishing.
Edited by .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address) on 01 Oct 2020 around 2pm
Book Prize PR in adversity with FMcM
by Caroline Guillet
This article is based on a panel organised during The Bookseller’s M&P Conference 2020. The session – “Eyes on the Prize, Takeaways from Book Prize PR on Working Culture” – welcomed FMcM team members Kealey Rigden, Daniel Kramb, Ashton Bainbridge and Annabel Robinson.
FMcM spans the worlds of publishing, prizes, festivals, NGOs and corporate partnerships and uses life-long expertise in the arts industry to work with the most inspiring organisations. When the UK entered lockdown, events started to be rendered digitally, but what about Book Prizes who strive from their red carpets and glamourous line-ups? FMcM had the huge responsibility of taking The Rathbones Folio Prize and The British Book Awards to the screen, whilst a pandemic was taking the world’s full attention.
Edited by .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address) on 04 Aug 2020 around 8am
Agile marketing in lockdown
by Caroline Guillet
Caroline shares some thoughts from the IPG Virtual Spring Conference, where she attended the session given by Alison Middle and Louise Dickens from Kogan Page.
Consumer behaviour has changed drastically since lockdown measures have been put in place, but overall readers still have appetite for content and are moving online to find it. Alison Middle and Louise Dickens discussed how independent publishers can use their agility to respond to shifts in reading and purchasing habits, but also media consumption, to make their books and digital resources as visible, discoverable and enjoyable as possible.
Edited by .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address) on 10 Jun 2020 around 8am
Corona time at OICP
by Caroline Guillet
The current situation has made me realize how everyone on this course came together, from lecturers to students, with a lot of support. I had never expected to fall in love with this degree this much, and I am going to miss everything so dearly when it comes to an end. I sincerely hope that we will all get to celebrate our year together when the government allows it again, but I have no doubt that we will cross paths in the future anyway.
Edited by .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address) on 02 Jun 2020 around 7am
OPUS Event: Technology and Publishers: Making It Work
by Caroline Guillet
On Tuesday 19 May 2020 the Oxford Publishing Society hosted an online event: Technology and Publishers: Making It Work. This event was attended remotely through Zoom. The speakers, (also online) were: Nick Barreto, Technology Director, Canelo, Rebecca Reddecliffe, Product Manager, Wiley, Nick Robinson, Co-founder, LearnJam and Laura Summers, Co-founder, BookMachine.
Here follows a report and summary of the presentations and the Q and A section.
Edited by .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address) on 26 May 2020 around 7am
The 2019 Future Book Forum
by Nina Clapperton
This October I got the opportunity with two colleagues to attend the 2019 Future Book Forum, enabled by Canon, in Munich in Germany. The moment the opportunity came up, I knew I wanted to go – and it wasn’t just because it was a free trip.
The Future Book Forum is all about publishers and printers working together to explore new avenues to develop our industry. This year, the theme was communities. I wasn’t entirely sure what they meant by that at first. Was it going to be all about online forums and book clubs? Or fanfiction sites and Tumblr accounts? Or Facebook groups and Reddit threads? Well, I was sort of right. Communities can be anything that bonds people together. At the conference, an anthropologist explained that communities have been an integral part of human development. We’ve succeeded because of our communities. Now, so can publishers.
Edited by .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address) on 29 Nov 2019 around 12pm
Internship at Wiley
by Natasha Chen
In the months leading up to the end of my undergraduate second year, I was struck by the panic that I had no experience, no clue what I was doing and whether I had any idea what I even wanted to do when I left university. It was enough to spur me to email one of the Publishing tutors responsible for work experience, Beverley Tarquini, for some advice, which was the start of moving me towards something new, terrifying and ultimately, fantastic.
Beverley sent me the details of a summer internship opportunity at Wiley: it was 10 weeks, in Oxford, in Marketing, and paid! It ticked all the boxes, so I applied (although leaving it a little late, and applying on the dot for the deadline) and waited to hear back. Later, I was contacted by HR and informed that I had made it to the next stage - a few interviews and one assessment day later, I was at Wiley and was now a fully fledged intern.
Edited by .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address) on 15 Oct 2019 around 7am
The Bookseller Children’s Conference 2019
by Louise Turner
Louise Turner is completing the MA Publishing via distance learning. She is a primary school governor, children’s library advocate, and ambassador for Nosy Crow. Find her on twitter @loucloverturner for children’s books, reading initiatives, and research.
Despite feeling somewhat out of my comfort zone, I chose to attend this year’s conference to keep abreast of the current challenges facing the children’s publishing landscape, and potentially generate areas for further investigation within my research. What follows is a summary of the talks and some of the key questions I felt were addressed within each session.
Edited by .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address) on 30 Sep 2019 around 9am
Internship at Emerald Publishing
by Katrina Bath
I chose Oxford Brookes simply because it was the best university for Publishing and student testimonies also praised Brookes for offering great student support. It was the last summer of my 3rd year at the University of Bradford and I had just handed in my final year dissertation for my bachelor’s degree in Media Studies. It’s safe to say that I was in a complete state of panic, I was done with university, had quit my part-time job to focus on my dissertation and now that all of that was done, a gaping black hole had opened in my mental place titled ‘future’. It was time for me to evaluate my life and what kind of career would make me happy so the first thing I did was make a list of all the things I loved doing. Books were at the top of that list and that’s how I began to wonder what career you could have around books and that is how I stumbled into the world of Publishing.
Edited by .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address) on 15 Aug 2019 around 7am