This week on the site, we were Revisiting elearning in the Web 2.0 age with Anna Faherty, and Felice Howden asked What Game Is Anobii Playing? Meanwhile, the London Literature Festival announces 2012 line-up, and Century buys rights to Wool, inevitable sheep jokes.

Elsewhere on the  web, it appears that Amazon aims to launch front-lit Kindle in July and Amazon launches CreateSpace in Europe.

As Pottermore adds Kobo as a Harry Potter e-book partner, and apparently Moglue Makes It Dead Simple For Anyone To Create And Publish Interactive Ebooks, there’s A Humorous Yet Truthful Look at Publishing, and The Book Designer is asking: Are You Trying to Create an “Impossible” Book?

And then there’s the big questions: Paper Book vs. Digital Book – Who reads which, where and why?

Finally, it appears that In E-Reader Age of Writer’s Cramp, a Book a Year Is Slacking.

On the site this week, we asked Do Publishers Expect Authors To Market Themselves? There was also the chance to Win a great new novel by asking the author a question!

While in the news, Virago to release ‘coming of age’ collection aimed at young women, Maya Angelou completists and ‘I don’t set out to make children happy’: RIP Maurice Sendak.

Elsewhere around the web, Are publishers waking up from their dream about apps? It seems this may be true for magazines, at least if you agree with these reasons Why Publishers Don’t Like Apps.

But as for books, there were some interesting thoughts this week from Nick Harkaway on the Evolution of Books, an outline of The Future Of Books In 7 Easy Steps, and Seth Godin revealed what he thinks is The real threat to (big time) book publishing.

On the digital front, here’s The complete guide to iBooks: from reading to selling, though it seems that iPad E-Reading Market Share Stagnates as Tablet E-Reading Rises, and a handy Infographic: Are eBook Readers Reading More?

Meanwhile, according to Smashwords CEO Mark Coker: Indie Authors Need to Become Great Publishers, while also knowing all about The Business of Writing Books.

And finally, why not Meet The 16-Year-Old Book Reviewer.

Last week’s breaking news from the USA was that Macmillan SFF imprint Tor have pledged to their readers that by ‘early July 2012, their entire list of e-books will be available DRM-free.’

Well done, Tor. Well done. I do think they’ve done their readers a favour, and it shows a really intelligent knowledge of their audience (the sort of reader who will get a Sony and then hack the living crap out of those devices so they can run a full Android OS. The kind that don’t want to be locked in to one device and one format.). They’ve pushed the boat out and started the debate about what no DRM would mean for publishers (a possible end to the reign of terror) raging again across the internet.

And now the fun begins.

There’s been a lot of bad shit going on in publishing of late. Stuff that genuinely makes me worried, and I think rightfully so, about the future of the industry. But hell, if the Frankfurt Book Fair is the Glastonbury of the publishing industry, then surely London Book Fair is Reading, where a bunch of publishing people get together and share some ideas – though not app sales figures – and rock out to some cool conference sessions, and, from what I understand, share the love for authors and books. Which is why I think it’s the perfect time to take some advice from The Singing Detective (yes, that’s a thing) and accentuate the positives.

I’m not going to lie – I’ve always thought audio books were lame as hell.  The disappointing nephew of the hardback; the ugly duckling of the literary landscape. They bring back memories of long car rides to boring towns when my mum would put on a tape of some Victorian period drama read by an artist’s rendering of Jane Austen. Invariably I would hear half of it and then miss some and then hear some more of it and the leaps in narrative would piss me off and the English accent would clash with the Australian landscape, and the cases for the tapes were ugly and would get under my feet  – a car accident waiting to happen. 

Hey guys – summer’s on the way! You know how I know? No, it wasn’t the record-breaking temperatures recorded in Aberdeenshire over the weekend. And no, it wasn’t that said temperatures prompted the populace of Glasgow to unveil reams of pasty winter-flesh to the world as if they were about to take a dip in the Med and weren’t standing next to what might be a pond but definitely has a junkie floating in it face down. It’s that as was the case last year, the first nourishing sun drippings of the season are accompanied by news of another totally senseless book banning in an American school for reasons that are dubious at best. Summer, guys! It’s back! Woo!

This week, you may want to contemplate the Hierarchies of ebook design, while bearing in mind what happens When Publishing Technology Attacks.

And as Consumers Start to Take Notice of the E-Book Library Lending Problem, Mike Shatzkin is Thinking more about ebooks and libraries and what big publishers should do.

Meanwhile, it’s been argued that the Apple Antitrust Suit Would Aid Amazon Book Monopoly.

On the self-publishing front, there’s talk of The Rise of Indie Authors and How This Helps Publishing and Why You Could Be the Next Stephen King, but here’s 5 Mistakes To Avoid When Requesting A Book Review.

Meanwhile, on the mainstream route, What Is an Author’s Marketing Responsibility With a Traditional Publisher?

And finally, once you’ve had a play around with the ‘Cranberry’ launch of Jellybooks – Discovering, Sharing and group buying ebooks, and checked out The Books That Read You, here 19 Musicians Share What Books They’re Currently Reading.

Before you get stuck in to this week, here are the publishing stories you may have missed over the past fortnight.

On BookMachine, we’ve been asking Where Are They Now? Cutting Edge Digital Developments that Didn’t Make It Work,  ‘Publishers are important,’ Val McDermid tells room full of publishers and Edinburgh Book Festival announces conference to commemorate that one time authors were snide to one another.

After last Monday’s post ‘Erotic Novel Serves as Good Fertiliser’ was followed by HarperCollins launching erotica for women, we make no apologies for an ill-fated attempt to get #eroticweek trending on Twitter.

Elsewhere on the web, Digital Book World asks Was March 2012 the month Traditional Publishing died? Well, certainly Britannica isn’t dead, it’s digital, apparently Most U.S. College Students Now Prefer Digital Reading, and Inkling Habitat may be reinventing the print press.  But are Ebooks: a new publishing solution to an old business problem?

Meanwhile, there were words On publishing and being a writer in the Right Now, and as Another Agent Lectures Authors, there was An agent’s manifesto over on The BookSeller.

Finally, BookWrap leaves you this week with The 10 Most Overused Words in Publishing.