BTW News Briefs

Hue-Man and Hudson Group Form Partnership

The Amsterdam News recently reported that Hue-Man Bookstore and the Hudson Group have formed a partnership that will "enable Hue-Man to brand its name and provide a distinct identity in potentially 500 Hudson newsstands and airport locations across the country.... Sometime this fall, after they work out the details of the co-branding agreement, there will be African-American sections, or bays, at 50 bookstores located at 10 airports in such major cities as Chicago, Atlanta, and New York City," AmNews noted.

"To bring brand awareness to the millions of world travelers who pass through airports everyday is phenomenal to me," Marva Allen, co-owner of Hue-Man Bookstore, told AmNews. "We are beyond pleased at the paring of this most unique and front-running idea. It takes great vision from each party to recognize the enormity of this endeavor and its necessity to the global world in which we live. It's mind-blowing."

Sara Hinckley, vice president of book purchasing and promotions at the Hudson Group, told AmNews, "It will be a perfect blend, a collaboration that will [combine] our experience as booksellers in airports and theirs in the urban communities. They [will] help us to determine exactly what books should be placed in the bays for special branding. This is a whole new level of operation, and we trust in the trust Hue-Man has established in the market."

Google Book Search Offers Out-of-Copyright Books

This week, Google Book Search began offering users the ability to download full copies of out-of-copyright print books "to read at your own pace," according to a Google Blog posting by Adam Mathes, associate product manager for Google Book Search. The posting notes that users can choose from a collection of public domain titles, ranging from "well-known classics to obscure gems."

Among the titles available on Google Book Search are Ferriar's The Bibliomania; 1931: A Glance at the Twentieth Century (written in 1881); Aesop's Fables; and Dante's Inferno.

BISG Appoints New Executive Director

On August 29, it was announced that Michael Healy, editorial director of Nielsen Book Services, had been appointed executive director of the Book Industry Study Group (BISG) and will be the keynote speaker at the trade association's Annual Meeting of Members on September 8 at the McGraw-Hill Auditorium in New York City.

"I couldn't be more thrilled about joining BISG during this exciting time in the book industry," Healy said in a statement. "Many parts of our industry are in a period of transforming change. Going forward, BISG will play a key role in defining new standards for the digital age while strengthening and extending those already in place. Building consensus as we seek to encourage greater efficiency in the evolving supply chain will continue to be a major focus for BISG."

Healy will officially begin his term as BISG executive director in mid-October.

ALA Reports Number of "Challenged" Books Drops to All-Time Low

The Associated Press notes that "the number of books threatened with removal from library shelves dropped last year to its lowest total on record, with 405 challenges reported to the American Library Association." ALA started tracking efforts to pull texts from libraries in the early 1980s when it helped to found Banned Books Week.

Judith Krug, director of ALA's Office for Intellectual Freedom, told AP that a couple of factors may have contributed to the decline in challenges: librarians are better prepared to organize community support on behalf of a book and would-be censors are focusing more on online content.

Banned Books Week, which takes place this year from September 23 - September 30, is sponsored by ABFFE, ALA, the Association of American Publishers, and the National Association of College Stores. Banned Books Week is also endorsed by the Center for the Book of the Library of Congress.