In this month's episode, Nastaran Bisheban, VP of Global Technology Delivery at Kobo, talks about their recently-launched audiobook program, their first audiobook original, and their future plans for audio content. And we speak to Book*hug's Hazel Millar about their record label, Chaos & Stars, that pairs authors with recording artists.
(Scroll down for a transcript of the conversation.)
Curious about some of the articles we reference in this month's episode? Find them here:
LiveMint: www.livemint.com/Companies/lObJNi…guin-Random.html
APA stats: www.publishersweekly.com/pw/by-topic/…-output.html
TechRadar: www.techradar.com/news/youll-soon-…books-in-walmart
Chaos & Star: bookthug.ca/chaos-and-star-records/
If you'd like to hear more from Nastaran Bisheban, Hazel Millar, and the rest of our The Future will not be Silent: Audio-first publishing panel, register for Tech Forum, March 23, 2018 in Toronto. You can find more details about the conference here, or sign up for our mailing list to get all of the conference updates.
You can subscribe to the podcast and listen on the go with iTunes, TuneIn, Pocket Casts, Google Play Music, and Stitcher.
Transcript
Ainsley: Welcome to the BookNet Canada podcast. I'm your host Ainsley Sparkes, and this month we're talking about audiobooks and Audio First Publishing. It's hard to have missed the buzz about audiobooks lately. If you follow the news that comes out of the publishing industry even a little, and you probably do since you're listening to this podcast, you'll have read and heard lots about it. Markus Dohle, CEO of Penguin Random House, says audiobooks could be the next big thing in an interview with "Live Mint". In the U.S., according to the Audio Publishers Association, total sales of audiobooks rose 18% in 2016 over 2015 while unit sales rose 34%. And in Canada, according to BookNet's consumer research, we're finding that audiobook purchases are holding steady at 2.6% of all format purchases, down only slightly from 2.3% in 2016. The big players in the tech industry seem to be getting the audiobook buzz memo too. On January 26th, courts published an article titled “Silicon Valley suddenly seems to care about books again”, centred around Google's January 2018 announcement that they're going to make audiobooks available in Google Play and Apple's forthcoming redesign of its iBooks app, now simply called Books. You may have also heard about Kobo's partnership with Walmart in the states where not only will Walmart sell Kobo's e-readers but also eBooks and audiobooks on their website. I spoke with Nastaran Bisheban, VP of Global Technology Delivery at Kobo about their recently launched audiobook program, their first audiobook original, and their future plans for audio content. So can you introduce yourself and your role?
Nastaran: Yes, I am Nastaran Bisheban, VP of Global Technology Delivery for Rakuten Kobo. My team and I are responsible for delivering all the softwares related for this ecosystem, from the software that goes directly to our e-reader and to the apps that we have for iOS and Android for our desktop, desktop app, any integration software behind the scene and database interest. So, we are the global technology delivery.
Ainsley: So Kobo just recently launched an audiobook program in September 2017. Can you tell us a bit about how it's been going and what the reaction to the subscription model has been?
Nastaran: Yes, we are receiving a lot of great responses from our audience. It seems its price point is working for us. The conversion rate is very high, more than what we expected. And all in all, still it is early in the game. We are very carefully listening to our audience's feedback. We have direct feedback channel that comes to the development team more than any other as well. So, we are listening to our customers. And lots of good things are about to come on this category.
Ainsley: Can you tell us about some of those good things?
Nastaran: It is a little bit premature to give the list of what are the good things, but I can tell you that they are coming directly from what our customers are asking for them.
Ainsley: We'll just have to keep an eye out then, I guess.
Nastaran: That's true.
Ainsley: So Kobo just released their first audiobook original, Zoe Whittle's "The Best Kind of People". It's exclusive to Kobo, but do you have plans to distribute it to other retailers?
Nastaran: Well, overall, exclusive content is a different niche, and we are very interested on this category. But yes, we are actually... We are planning to expand this and we believe that it is actually in the interest of the authors that audiobooks are available in as many channels as possible. That's exactly why we actually encourage our agents and publishers to create their own audiobooks or to collaborate with Kobo, instead of putting the, you know, long-term viability of the small Canadian market at risk by giving exclusive rights to one part. That position logically also means that Kobo will also consider distribution to other channels.
Ainsley: Has it happened with "The Best Kind of People" or is it something that's still to come?
Nastaran: It is to come.
Ainsley: Did you have your own recording studio at Kobo? How does the production work?
Nastaran: Well, we work very closely with agents and publishers to grow the Canadian audiobook catalogue. We collaborate with the publishers when they are the rights holders or producer, you know, at the same page, or we actually produce our own audio files as Kobo originals. For the actual production, we are partnering with a very wide number of the producers with various levels of involvement in the actual recording and editing.
Ainsley: And you are planning on focusing on Canadian content mostly through your audiobook originals?
Nastaran: We are a global country, and at the same time, the local content are the front and center of our plan. So, we are successful by local content. At the same time, we are global. So, globally, we are focusing on a local content.
Ainsley: I see. So you're doing local content throughout the world?
Nastaran: Exactly.
Ainsley: Are there plans to scale up your audiobook production and what will that look like?
Nastaran: Absolutely. We are planning to have more focus on this category. And actually, for the audio first content, we just announced the Kobo Originals program yesterday for both ebooks and audio with the growing importance of audio, we will also produce audio first titles.
Ainsley: So by audio first, do you mean books that are first produced in audio format, and they may or may not have a print edition to come?
Nastaran: Correct. Yes. Well, we are evaluating all the options but this is certainly one area of focus.
Ainsley: Do you think there are benefits to audio first content, as opposed to the traditional model of recording an audiobook from the print version of the book? Do you think, for example, it will reach a different type of listener?
Nastaran: Traditionally, audio has been an afterthought of the book, in general. But with the growing popularity of this genre, basically genre, the media, the vehicle we will for sure see the emergence of an audio-only audience. So, we being directly responding to the need of our audience, we don't see why not to go through that path as well. So that makes it also interesting to see if there are better ways to reach that customer. So, certainly, we do have the audio first in the review with serious focus on.
Ainsley: So, what do you think are the factors that have contributed to the rise in audiobook listening?
Nastaran: Yeah, well, in general, really it is due to rise of mobile technology, easier access and easier use, cheaper, you know, cost of, you know, data. But in general, Kobo's motto has always been to increase the reading time for the customer. And we have started with read in the sun with having the first kind of...first of our devices, not to have any glare. Then have reading at night with having a backlight available. Then making that backlight available customed with a more reduced blue light and have the different kind of yellow light. The word is not coming to me. So, our goal is increase the reading time. Now, with the expansion to the audiobook, we are actually increasing the time of reading to the time that you cannot actually look. So, that's basically what is our front and center motto to make sure that we are increasing the reading. And audiobook is certainly a vehicle that gives us that opportunity.
Ainsley: It's a goal I'm sure that a lot of people in Canadian publishing would like to share.
Nastaran: Absolutely. Think about how commuting time and everything else has increased for the people. And there are so many easy read, easy listen to also that you normally don't get to but due the prioritization of your reading lists and everything else, that having the commute time, having it available when you cannot look at the book is absolutely an increased kind of capability. I personally have started listening to one audiobook per week expanding to the genre and categories that originally I wouldn't have time to spend. I have a longer commute. I spend it on listening to audiobooks and it is paying off.
Ainsley: So, what do you know about the demographics of the audiobook listener? Are they significantly different from the ebook reader?
Nastaran: Actually, we are looking at the same group of the ebook reader, but maybe a little bit more towards adult males, and slightly younger. So, we are seeing the same kind of category, more male and somehow younger audience added to the list.
Ainsley: Do you think that will influence the types of audiobooks you produce?
Nastaran: Certainly. Our audience will be driving what we do.
Ainsley: Does accessibility factor into your audiobook production heavily?
Nastaran: Absolutely, yes. We have a very elaborate lab that we put into all the new features, all the requirements, recommendations that are coming directly from our customer's channel, and practice them in our lab. And we'll look to enhance the accessibility more and more.
Ainsley: Great. Well, thank you for taking the time to speak with me.
Nastaran: My pleasure.
Ainsley: While the big international players are focused on getting into the market and scaling up their production, a homegrown Indie publisher is experimenting with audio in a thoughtful and artistic way. Book*hug got into the record-making business in August 2017, with their record label, Chaos & Star. I spoke to Hazel Miller about this new project. So can you introduce yourself?
Hazel: Certainly. So my name is Hazel Millar, and I'm the co-publisher at Book*hug. Book*hug is an independent literary press. We're based here in Toronto, and yeah, we're currently celebrating our 14th anniversary.
Ainsley: Wow, that's great. So you're going to be at Tech Forum speaking on a panel about Audio First Publishing. As part of that, we've asked you to talk about Chaos & Star Record label. I was wondering if you could tell us a little bit more about that.
Hazel: Certainly. So Chaos & Star is our new literary record imprint, I guess. It was born out of a conversation that we had with our friend, musician, Andrew Whiteman. And for those of you who might, I guess, not know, Andrew is a musician involved in various acts, including Broken Social Scene and Aurora, and more. And for a while, Andrew has been working on a side project, really what he calls Sonic poetry. And with that, he has worked together with other musicians and writers in order to come together and collaborate and perhaps reinvent the two mediums that they're working in. We've been longtime fans of his sonic poetry project. We're very familiar with it. And we're really happy to have this conversation with Andrew about how we have books that might be able to become involved in it.
And, you know, we started to explore the various questions that he'd already been thinking about, such as, you know, can contemporary writing be pop? Can contemporary music be literary? And because we were so interested, really, in these questions, we decided to venture forth and create a new imprint really, that would allow this project to sort of grow, and for us, particularly to involve our authors at Book*hug in this project by then pairing them with independent musicians and to create a new medium, really. So, that's how it was born. And we've so far, three limited editions, seven-inch vinyl records, because that was the end goal, was to actually produce records. And we did so by selecting three authors from our list and carefully thinking through who we would want to pair them with as musicians and then we sent them off to work together and collaborate and create two singles so that we would be able to therefore produce a seven-inch side A and side B record.
Ainsley: That's really cool. How do you choose the author and musician pairings? What kind of decision-making do you do in that process?
Hazel: Yeah. A lot of it is honestly gut feeling. In the case of our authors that we first chose to work with, we knew we wanted to choose three. So, a pilot project for Chaos & Stars was going to always be three. And we consulted first with Andrew as well. And we said... We knew Andrew would always be a part of the project, of course. And, you know, together, we all really went through our list, and we were looking at authors that were either involved in our current season or who still had quite relatively new or recent titles with us so that, you know, we had a window in that regards of who we were looking at. And the three names that we selected...three authors that really jumped out at us from the beginning, it was, again, just the instinct that these were the right authors to choose.
And we chose Jacob Wren who we've published several times over at this point. And it was Andrew actually who really expressed a desire to work with Jacob. And we also chose two poets from our list, Jennifer LoveGrove, and Liz Worth because, again, we just thought that there was so much musicality in their text already that it just felt like really good choices for exploring a musical side of their books. And then, as far as the musicians were concerned, again, it was a lot of gut instinct of just who we thought would be a good pairing. We were so intimately familiar with the text, of course. And given that Andrew had expressed a sincere desire to work with Jacob, then we knew that that pairing was going to work. And Jacob also was very excited to work with Andrew. So that was an easy fix or pairing to make, I guess. With Jennifer LoveGrove, her book is highly... It's very dreamlike and almost surreal at times. And we immediately thought of John K. Samson and Christine Fellows who we've known for a long time and really admire the work that they produce. And we thought they'd be a perfect fit because a lot of what they've produced in the past seem to explore similar themes, really, to what we knew was in Jen's work.
And they were really excited to come on board and just happened to be available because they're very, very busy people, but they were available and jumped at the opportunity. So that worked. And then as for Liz Worth, we were a little bit more stumped at first at who we were going to pair her with. And we reached out to Jason Collett who's a friend of ours as well. And we know Jason from his work with the basement review and whatnot. And we asked him if he could recommend, you know, a Canadian independent musician or band that might be a good fit for Liz Worth. Her book is about Andy Warhol. And he immediately suggested two of the members of a Toronto band called Zeus who had recently been doing some scores for film work. And so we reached out to them and they, again, jumped at the opportunity to do this project just having come fresh off of doing the film scoring that they've been working on. And it was actually like a magical fit in that case. When they first sent back to us the work that they produced for the text, it was immediate, like, ah yes, that was perfect.
Ainsley: That's cool. I mean, it helps to have very cool friends.
Hazel: Yeah.
Ainsley: Are all the contributors Canadian?
Hazel: Yes. Yeah.
Ainsley: Is that a conscious decision to have all your contributors be Canadian?
Hazel: It is. Yes, it is. It was something that, again, when we started to really have this conversation with Andrew, his sonic poetry project that he'd been working on for so many years, he's worked very often with American authors, American poets such as Alice Notley, and Anne Waldman, and others. And at first, that was something he had really hoped we would be able to bring to the project, like an extension of working with, you know, more Americans or other international authors. But for us, it was very important, like as a Canadian independent literary press, it was for us to collaborate with him on extending this project, it was very important that we work with Canadian musicians.
Ainsley: And so you mentioned that the original idea was to have vinyl, but you also offer digital releases of all these as well. Was that planned from the beginning, or was that a phase to...?
Hazel: No, it was always planned because with regards to the vinyl, it was also very intentional that they were going to be limited edition pieces. We wouldn't be producing, you know, a never-ending supply of vinyl. So, I think we decided from the get-go, we would produce 500 copies of this limited edition vinyl. And then, you know, once they're gone, they're gone. But it will always be available as a digital download. And so, yes, that was always part of the plan that both formats would be available.
Ainsley: Do you have more releases planned in the future?
Hazel: We do plan to do more. We don't actually have any lined up at the moment. And that's mostly because we've been so very busy in the background working on our rebrand. Just a whole other conversation we could have. So, for now, as we have had to do with other projects, we've had to sort of hit the pause button on, you know, producing more, but we absolutely intend to produce more. And the goal would be to do one or two a year once we get back on track with it.
Ainsley: And will they always be adaptations of books that you've printed or have you any thoughts on doing audio first type publishing?
Hazel: I mean, it's a very good question. And as I would say to almost anything, I guess never say never. I would certainly say that, you know, we could possibly move towards doing audio first in the future. For now, though, our immediate goal is to continue the project as it is in that it's, you know, an extension of the book project. So, yes, like, for the immediate future at any rate, we'll continue with this. But, you know, sort of say never say never. And if the right opportunity came along for an audio first project then, certainly, we would explore that.
Ainsley: Do you think...? I mean, there's been a lot of talk lately about the rise in the audiobook. More and more people are listening to them. Do you think that that has had an impact on your Chaos & Stars project, or do you think they're completely separate?
Hazel: I mean, I see them as separate to an extent certainly, but I also do see them as being very complimentary. So, I would absolutely agree that for readers and listeners alike who have, you know, turned to audiobooks as a platform that they're experimenting with and listening to, then I would hope too that, yes, our Chaos & Stars project would therefore be something they'd wanna also listen to. Certainly.
Ainsley: And do you think you've answered the questions about is literature pop and...?
Hazel: And is music literary? Yes. I mean, I certainly hope so. I mean, we definitely wanna continue exploring those questions hence the, you know, desire to continue with more pairings for the imprint moving forward. But yeah. I mean, so long answer short, yes. There are questions that we hope we've answered, but we wanna continue exploring, in more depth, certainly.
Ainsley: Do you think you'll ever try the other way around, start with a piece of music, and then have an author collaborate on that?
Hazel: Possibly. Again, like I said before, I guess I would never say never. It was quite interesting when we first launched the imprint. Over the first couple of days, we were inundated with musicians posing that very question to us. So, you know, again, certainly, that could be something that we might explore in the future. For now, because again, we've come at this as, you know, at the sort of very core of it, I guess, it's an extension of a book project that the road we'll continue to go down for now while we continue to overcome that steep learning curve of producing records. But yeah, certainly in the future, that could be another possibility, another way to help evolve the project.
Ainsley: That's very cool. Well, thank you for talking with me.
Hazel: You're very welcome.
Ainsley: Both Nastaran Bisheban and Hazel Millar will be speaking at Tech Forum 2018 on a panel called "The Future Will Not Be Silent: Audio First Publishing." So get your tickets to this conference that focuses on digital developments in the book publishing industry to hear more about this subject and much more. Thanks to Nastaran and Hazel for joining me on this month's podcast. If you'd like to check out more stats on the Canadian audiobook listener or learn more about what we do, you can visit us at booknetcanada.ca. We gratefully acknowledge the financial support of the Government of Canada through the Canada Book Fund for this project. And of course, thanks to you for listening.
