Business book author’s decision to move ebook rights to Amazon may prove a turning point

Stephen Covey’s decision to move from his traditional, conventional publisher, Simon and Schuster, to Rosetta Books an electronic book publisher working in association with Amazon, may turn out to be one of those moments in the history of book publishing when everything changed and wild forces were released into the creative environment.

Mind you, Covey has been lucky with his timing. The announcement that he is moving the ebook rights of two of his most successful titles to Amazon.com comes after a week in which the chief executive of Random House US unilaterally declared to literary agents that the imprints under his control had “the exclusive right to publish in electronic book publishing formats”. For some commentators this salvo was the opening of hostilities in a war between publishers and authors’ representatives that has been in the offing for more than a decade.  Guardian

Technorati Tags: covey