Released on = August 10, 2007, 7:47 am

Press Release Author = Connecthru.com

Industry =

Press Release Summary = Despite the blog's colloquial image, they are not just some
blog anymore. Especially when it comes to books - blogs are taken pretty seriously.
Needless to say, the academic blog scene is booming. Students are asked to upload
assignments for peer-review, comment, post responses, surveys, etc. Other
establishments outside of academia are adapting theses same features for their
blogs.

Press Release Body = By: D.L Ficalora

A few years ago one of my English professors was on a mission to bring as many poets
to class as she could. In one week she invited several speakers to our seminar that
semester: a poet who endured writing under communist China, a woman who preformed
poetry by running strings through the lecture hall, and then a third poet: just some
dude. We all joked that our professor found him somewhere on the subway. This
"poet" arrived in a messy t-shirt, and looked like a bordered-line between bum and
bohemian; to make matters worse, he wrote his poetry on a BLOG! As he asked the
computer projection screen come down, you could see the pretentious noses turned
upwards in protest. We wouldn't take him seriously. Surely blogs were no venue for
literature.

.but that was years ago.

Despite the blog's colloquial image, they are not just some blog anymore.
Especially when it comes to books - blogs are taken pretty seriously. Needless to
say, the academic blog scene is booming. Students are asked to upload assignments
for peer-review, comment, post responses, surveys, etc. Other establishments
outside of academia are adapting theses same features for their blogs. Business
types are relying on similar blog features to sell products. One such example is
Amazon's new blog site: The Amazon Bookstore Blog.

The latest trend in bookselling is happening one blog post at a time. Customers who
visit Amazon's Bookstore Blog are brought to a homepage chock-full of very active
conversation between booksellers, readers, and authors. The main information
streaming on the homepage is news feed run by Amazon called "Daily Book News." This
blog is a brief overview of hot new titles. If those books don't peek the
consumer's interest, Amazon has also set up a feature where visitors can select the
literary genre of their interest. These sections are listed in the right slide-bar
of the Amazon Blog Site. Customers can select the genre of books that they are most
interested in: literature, graphic novels, fantasy, fashionista, and there is (of
course) an entire section dedicated to Harry Potter.

The Amazon Bookstore Blog appeals to several consumer groups: potential buyers who
are interested in purchasing a book, but they need to know more about it; people who
are interested in what a particular author is publishing; and then others who are
interested in organized, on-line book groups. Amazon provides the first group of
people with something of a consumer report on the new title that is a little more
in-depth than an average book review. The comment option allows anyone to respond
to the initial post with his or her own opinions and questions.

The comment feature on the Amazon Bookstore Blog is a wonderful way to encourage
interaction between consumers and sellers. However, this feature can be
particularly useful for the Amazon Reading Group Blog. On this section of the site
readers can participate in conversations pertaining to the book discussed that week.
They can respond to the questions prompted through the comment function or they can
create their own questions and comments section on this page.

Readers aren't the only people blogging. Authors also blog on the Amazon site.
These webpages are either set up as a forum or as an interview; the author can write
a big post, or respond to questions from the audience or interviewer. Consumers can
visit these sites to read about what their favorite author is promoting, what they
have written, and if they have plans to write anything more in the future. Authors
also have a chance to put out information about events like book signings, tours,
radio interviews, etc.

Even though Amazon's physical products, the books, are the same: cover, spine, paper
pages, text, the ways of promoting them is changing. It's hybrid now. It's online,
on blogs, now in the hands of savvy booksellers. The Amazon Bookstore Blog is an
innovative space for consumers, sellers, and authors to congregate for conversations
about books. After all, why not? Blogs have come to be a very appropriate place to
talk about literature.


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