Recently, the State Press and Publication Administration released the "Development Plan for the 14th Five-Year Plan period of the publishing industry" (hereinafter referred to as the "Planning"), which mentions the plan to promote the formulation of relevant laws and regulations, including the "book price legislation" that has been proposed by industry insiders for many years.
In the section "Regulating the Order of Online and Offline Publishing", the "Planning" proposes: Strictly regulate the cooperation between publishing units and private institutions, and seriously investigate and deal with the behavior of "buying and selling ISBN". Strengthen the supervision and management of publication prices, promote book price legislation, effectively stop the vicious "price war" of online and offline publication sales, and create a healthy and orderly market environment. Further consolidate the main responsibilities of relevant units and platforms for online publishing, strengthen hierarchical and categorical management, improve innovative content supervision methods and means, increase special governance in key areas such as online games, and deal with the problems and chaos reflected by the people, and better optimize the online publishing ecology.
At the two sessions of the National People's Congress in 2020, Tan Yue, Pan Kaixiong, and Yu Dianli, members of the National Committee of the Chinese People's Political Consultative Conference, jointly put forward the "Proposal on Legislation to Regulate the Retail Price Competition of Books", which pointed out that as early as 2010, the China Publishers Association, the China Book Publishing Industry Association and the China Xinhua Bookstore Association jointly issued the "Book Fair Trade Rules", a norm for the domestic book publishing industry, in order to regulate the discount chaos in book retail, which clearly stipulates that " New books entering the retail market must not be sold less than 8.5% within one year." However, soon after the introduction of this "rule", which was called the "book ban", it died due to reasons such as "three publishing units do not have relevant qualifications" and "suspected of violating the Anti-Monopoly Law of the People's Republic of China".
It is worth mentioning that on September 27, 2021, Liu Yuanyuan, an internet celebrity anchor, opened a special live broadcast of 100 million yuan, known as "shouting half of the Chinese publishing house", and indicated in the trailer that 500,000 books with a price of less than 10 yuan and 100,000 books with a price of 1 yuan were prepared. According to statistics, in the first half, Liu Yuanyuan's live broadcast room listed a total of 124 books and entertainment products, of which 58 products were priced at less than 10 yuan in the live broadcast room, accounting for nearly 50%.
Liu Yuanyuan's live broadcast immediately attracted the concern and questioning of people in the book publishing industry, saying that this practice of drinking and quenching thirst is undoubtedly expelling good money from bad money, which has seriously disrupted the business development order of the book publishing industry. For a book of 10 yuan or even 1 yuan, where does the profit of the publishing house come from?
According to industry insiders, for live broadcasting, the cost includes the copyright and printing costs of the book itself, the cost of logistics, the commission share of the anchor, the expenditure of customer service manpower, etc. No matter how to calculate, it is difficult to calculate how the genuine book below 10 yuan has profit margins, let alone 1 yuan of books, even if it is to inventory, it is necessary to pay a single logistics cost of 3 yuan to 5 yuan.
If the "book price legislation" can be successfully implemented, the positioning of book prices will also have a law to follow. Creators, publishers, and physical bookstores have more protective barriers, which can carefully polish their works, which will help the book publishing market and cultural industry to develop more standardized. I believe that in the near future, the trend of reading for all will be more popular.
This group of articles / reporters Zhang Enjie
Co-ordinator/Liu Jianghua
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Inauguration of the first Olympic book house in Beijing
Experience 5G immersive new reading
The First Olympic-themed library in Beijing, the Olympic Book House, the first Olympic-themed library open to the public, jointly established by the Capital Library and the Capital Institute of Physical Education, was officially inaugurated on January 5 on the west side of the south gate of the First Sports College.
Pang Wei, deputy director of the Beijing Municipal Bureau of Culture and Tourism, mentioned in his speech that the Capital Library, as a municipal "dragon head museum", has joined forces with the Capital Institute of Physical Education to highlight the characteristics of the Winter Olympics and jointly build the Olympic Book House of the Sports Branch of the Capital Library, which not only publicizes sports and the Olympic spirit, but also provides a good place for citizens, teachers and students to read, adding to the cultural color of the city.
It is understood that the Olympic Book House now has more than 2,000 sports-themed Chinese books and nearly a thousand Olympic-themed books in foreign languages, and also accommodates 3 million e-books, more than 500,000 sets of audiobooks, tens of thousands of electronic newspapers and periodicals, and high-quality digital resources such as the "Digital Winter Olympics", which are available to readers anytime and anywhere. High-quality books in five categories, including politics, sports, classics, popular science, and children, were selected for recommendation, and a special shelf of "Please Read Books" books and a digital resource promotion exhibition were set up.
At the same time, the Olympic Bookstore has also become a member of the 425 member libraries of the Beijing Public Library card service system, which can not only realize the borrowing and return of books in 395 member libraries with the function of borrowing and returning, but also opened the Capital Library and 14 district libraries to borrow books on call and on-call value-added services.
The Olympic Book House is not only equipped with rich collections, massive resources, and convenient service network, but also holds exhibition displays, theme reading activities and other services, allowing citizens to experience 5G immersive new reading. "After the establishment of the Olympic Book House, it will be committed to becoming an important channel for promoting the people to share the Olympic Games, becoming a high-quality medium for publicizing Olympic knowledge and promoting Olympic culture, and becoming a new platform for promoting excellent traditional culture and innovating reading for all." Chen Zuosong, vice president of the Capital Institute of Physical Education, made a solemn promise to the readers who came to the bookstore and who were about to come to the bookstore.
Open from Tuesday to Sunday 10:00-20:00
Address: Beijing Haidian District North Third Ring Road No. 11 Capital Institute of Physical Education South Gate West Side (Beijing Metro Line 13 Dazhongsi Station A Northwest Exit)