and more.
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As Publishers Ramp Up AI Implementation, Employees Slow Down
Data from 771 professionals surveyed by the Book Industry Study Group and BookNet Canada found publishers’ AI use at the organizational level jumped to 63%, from 48% in 2025, while individual use dropped from 46% in 2025 to 38% today.
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Rakuten Kobo Returns to U.S. Retail as Sales Double
Best Buy is now stocking Kobo’s e-readers, which have been absent from U.S. retail since its partnership with Walmart ended in 2024. CEO Michael Tamblyn identifies several factors that have stirred up interest in the company stateside and abroad.
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Spotify Adds More AI-Powered Discovery Tools for Audiobooks
The new features include the ability to automatically create audiobook playlists with a prompt, ask natural language questions about books’ contents or reading recommendations, and a more robust system to track books in a series.
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Fable Surpasses 5 Million Users
The social reading platform has added some 2 million users since last June, nearly all of whom under 40. Fable’s recent growth, executives say, defies reports that reading is in decline among young people.
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E-books Gain Popularity in Canada
A study from BookNet Canada show that 71% of the reading population read an e-book in 2025, with many purchases of the format motivated by affordability. Mystery, thriller and romance were the most popular genres.
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Some Listeners Prefer AI Narration for Multi-Voice Audiobooks
A survey commissioned by audiobook production company Spoken found listeners rated its multi-voice AI narration favorably against human narration, while the Audiobook Publishers Association’s own research found human voices are highly preferred.
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Pew Survey Finds Readers Still Prefer Print Books
Though e-books and audiobooks have gained ground over the last 14 years, 64% of adults recently surveyed by the Pew Research Center said they would rather read print books.
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Some Publishing Pros See AI as ‘a Great Leveler’
At an all-women panel held virtually on March 24, execs from the AI-driven publishing companies DeMarque, Editrix.ai, and Shimmr.ai described how technology is reshaping their workflows and the industry at large.
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Pagebound Bets on Human Curation Over Algorithms
The social reading platform aims to offer an alternative to Goodreads, where users can track their progress, complete “quests,” and share book recommendations. It has attracted 130,000 users who have created 25,000 forums.
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Audible Now Lets You Read Along with Your Kindle Books
Audible has added its new Read & Listen feature, which allows users to follow audiobook narration with synchronized, word-by-word highlighted text, provided they own the Kindle e-book.
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