Apple opens the door for authors to self-publish

Apple Inc. has established a means for authors to publish books independently through its iBookstore application.

Authors must meet certain criteria to distribute their work through iBookstore, including proving that they own or control the contents, posses an international standard book number and can deliver books electronically in the ePub digital publishing format. E-books formatted in the ePub standard are supported by most of the e-book readers on the market other than Amazon’s Kindle.

Apple, No. 4 in the Internet Retailer Top 500 Guide, also suggests authors consider commercial entities, or aggregators, for assistance in distributing their books digitally, such as Bibliocore, Ingram and LuLu. In such arrangements Apple works with the aggregator, who receives a predetermined fee.

The new iBookstore app is embedded on the iPad, and is the conduit for consumers to buy electronic books. Five publishers—Penguin Group, HarperCollins Publishers, Simon & Schuster Inc., Macmillan Publishers Ltd. and Hachette Book Group—announced their support of the app in January.

Since then Apple, Amazon and other e-book retailers have revised their original plans to offer e-books at deep discounts, a strategy that unnerved publishers fearful consumers would come to consider printed books overpriced. . In response to pressure from the publishing industry, several of the major e-book retailers have agreed to let publishers set their own prices, typically giving retailers 30% of the selling price as a commission.

Apple’s program follows similar announcements from booksellers Alibris Inc. and Barnes & Noble Inc.

Alibris recently launched Author Stores, a program aimed at helping self-published authors better promote and sell to readers by listing their books in numerous marketplaces and online stores.

Barnes & Noble plans to launch an application on its web site that enables independent publishers and self-publishing authors to sell digital versions of their books that can be read on some e-reader devices.