Since 1935, the New York Times has been a recognized leader in ranking the bestselling books across a variety of categories in the publishing world.
But as the ebook industry explodes and now accounts for an enormous 10% chunk of all books purchased in the US today, it would seem only fitting for the venerable publication to similarly rank and report the bestselling titles of the electronic variety.
And that’s exactly what the paper is now going to do.
The New York Times has announced plans to begin publishing the most popular fiction and nonfiction titles in e-books.
The Times says it will formulate its e-book list from the data provided on a regular weekly basis from both publishers and booksellers.
Janet Elder of the New York Times says her paper has spent a considerable amount of time (roughly two years) designing a workable system to monitor and track e-book sales.
“We’ve had our eye on e-book sales since e-books began,” Elder said. “It was clear that e-books were taking a greater and greater share of total sales, and we wanted to be able to tell our readers which titles were selling and how they fit together with print sales.”
According to the official announcement, the Times will also “redesign the section of its Sunday Book Review that features the best-seller lists.”
To read the complete New York Times article, click here.
