Last modified on Thu 10 Jun 2021 09.10 EDT
Bestselling writers including Philip Pullman and Kate Mosse are warning of a “potentially devastating” change to the UK’s copyright laws that could damage authors’ livelihoods by flooding the UK market with cheap foreign editions.
The Intellectual Property Office launched a consultation this week into the UK’s approach to copyright in the wake of Brexit. One option under consideration would see a change to the “copyright exhaustion” rule, which governs when the control of a rights holder over the distribution of their property expires. For example, if a customer buys a book, then the owner of the book’s copyright would not then be able to prevent the customer selling that book to another person in the same territory.
The Ghana Library Authority (GhLA) lifted the flag of Ghana high on the international stage when it was adjudged Library of the Year at the London Book Fair (LBF) International Excellence Awards 2021.
London Book Fair: The 2021 International Excellence Awards Shortlist
The eighth annual iteration of these awards includes recognition for rights professionals, audiobook publishers, bookstores, educational learning resources, and more.
An April 27 shot at London’s Paddington Central, where boat restaurants and bars have opened for outdoor dining. Image – Getty iStockphoto: Kauka Jarvi
Lotinga: ‘Publishers, Booksellers, and Librarians’
Fifteen nations are represented on the shortlist for this year’s all-digital London Book FairInternational Excellence Awards, announced this morning (May 10) in the United Kingdom.
As we reported on Thursday (May 6), London’s digital edition in June now spans three weeks, with events between June 7 and July 1, forming a kind of Bologna Children’s Book Fair sandwich, with that leading children’s trade show running June 14 to 17.
Book sales grow during pandemic Richard Stuart-Turner Tuesday, May 4, 2021
The invoiced value of UK printed consumer publishing increased by 4% in 2020, remaining resilient during the coronavirus pandemic.
The report highlighted mixed overall fortunes for print in 2020
A new report from the Publishers Association, ‘
Publishing in 2020: resilient in the face of Covid’, found that total consumer publishing sales income rose by 7% last year to £2.1bn. The UK consumer publishing market grew by 9% to £1.5bn while the export market was up by 4% to £675m.
While digital saw the biggest consumer publishing growth, up 24% to £418m, print also had a successful year, the 4% increase taking its value to £1.7bn.