GigaOM, an online news site focused on technology and media disruption, has launched GigaOM Books, a digital publishing imprint that will specialize in e-books offering news, trends and analysis about the developing digital economy. The new imprint debuts with four original e-books and two e-books originally published by GigaOM Pro Reports, the company’s technology research unit.
The new imprint will release an original e-book a month not including the research titles that will also be reissued through GigaOM Books. At launch all GigaOM Books will be available for sale through Amazon (Kindle), Apple (iTunes) and B&N (the Nook).
Michael Wolf, GigaOM v-p, said the new titles will also eventually be available from Kobo as well. The imprint is “digital-first” and the line will focus on e-books, but Wolf told PW that “if we have a hit, we’ll definitely take a look at a POD edition. But we want to stay digital. We’re a startup venture and we want to stay lean.”
Among the titles released are Connected Health: How Mobile Phones,Cloud and Big Data will Reinvent Health Care by Jody Ranck ($7.99) and Cut the Cord: All You Need to Know to Drop Cable by Janko Roettgers($4.99). All the titles focus on trends in digital media and are generally under a 100 pages and fall under the new digital “long-form journalism” length that has emerged as a kind of new digital book length. Prices range from $2.99 for The Battle for the Books: Inside Google’s Gambit to Create the World’s Biggest Library by Jeff Roberts to $9.99 for Near Term Outlook for Big Data. Connected Health is about 150 pages. Most books will likely be about 50 traditional pages, Wolf said.
Wolf said pricing was determined by looking at the market and most titles were “priced a little below similar titles in the market to be competitive. We’re testing the pricing of these titles.” GigaOM Pro Reports are bundles of several reports that the company sells for about $300, so GigaOM Books will be focused on very specific topics, he said, “We’re not trying to cannibalize our research business.” He also emphasized that while the line will reissue some of its research reports as GigaOM Books, most GigaOM titles will be original works, commissioned from a variety of expert-authors and acquired through a conventional publishing process that includes a small advance and royalties. And GigaOM Books is soliciting writers to submit ideas and manuscripts for future titles.
While some traditional publishers are dropping the word “book” from their digital offerings as the digital economy focuses on “content,” Wolf said GigaOM Books wanted to be specific to distinguish the new titles from other GigaOM content. “We want this to be like any other publishing venture," Wolf said. "We’re a technology outlet but we want to see if we can connect with other media through books. Books are still a high value concept package and they’re another way for our readers to consume content on their devices.”
