SharedBook: On Demand

Techtini Pocket Guide Debuts

We have been working with Kristen Nicole to develop the Techtini Pocket Guide, a collaborative project that is designed to showcase individuals and companies in the Web community.

The project was Kristen's idea (inspired by the creation of The Kristini at DEMO earlier this year), and SharedBook's collaborative on-demand publishing platform is making it happen. Proceeds from book sales will support Idealist, a project of Action Without Borders.

We are pleased to report that the site is now live and the Techtini Pocket Guide made its debut at the first TECH cocktail Conference in Chicago earlier today. See below.

Anyone can now add a favorite cocktail recipe and/or produce a book from the recipes that have been posted to date. One note: all content is subject to editorial review. Please allow 24 hours for a newly submitted recipe to become a part of the book.

Please click here to view a sample flipbook of the Techtini Pocket Guide

Mother's Day Gift Ideas

Soon after we introduced Your Daily Inspiring Word, the first personalized 365-day devotional, we realized that the book would be a thoughtful and unique gift idea for Mother's Day. Since it takes a few days to produce the personalized book, we just posted a gift certificate that can be purchased up until 6:00 p.m. EST on Thursday for last minute shoppers.

If a personalized Christian prayer book doesn't sound like the right choice for your mom, gift certificates are also available for Create-A-Cookbook from Allrecipes.com and the BigOven Cookbook.

SharedBook and Publishing 2020

Joe Wikert posted an interview with Caroline on his Publishing 2020 blog today. They covered a lot of topics and It's worth a look if you're interested in learning more about SharedBook and the technology we provide.

Thank You

We had a couple of nice surprises today. First Caroline noticed that Joe Wikert mentioned ProfessionalTravelGuide's Pocket Guidebook on his Publishing 2020 blog. We were expecting Joe to take a look when he could, but didn't realize he had gotten to it. Then, quite unexpectedly, I received a call from Pastor Wiley Drake of the Wiley Drake Radio Show regarding Your Daily Inspiring Word. Pastor Drake was LIVE, on the air, and gave us the opportunity to tell his listeners more about the new personalized daily prayer book! Thank you both.

If you would like to learn more about Your Daily Inspiring Word, today's announcement is available via Christian News Wire and PRWeb.

Your Daily Inspiring Word

How appropriate that today, on the day of the Pope’s visit to New York and on the eve of Passover, SharedBook has launched its first of many personalized products for the Christian marketplace. Your Daily Inspiring Word is the first personalized 365 day devotional.

Created for SharedBook by Paul McManus, author of The 7 Great Prayers, with scripture and devotions from Morning and Evening: Daily Readings by Charles Haddon Spurgeon, Your Daily Inspiring Word allows users to add their name to the prayers and cover, and to use a photo of their choice to grace the back cover.

At $19.95, including shipping, Your Daily Inspiring Word opens an exciting marketplace for customized and personalized products and for SharedBook. We hope you’ll check it out for yourself, as well as for family and friends, and give us your feedback. Chag Sameach!

ProfessionalTravelGuide.com Introduces Personalized Pocket Guidebook

We're excited to share that ProfessionalTravelGuide.com is introducing a personalized Pocket Guidebook today. ProfessionalTravelGuide.com offers the industry's largest database of travel information and professional reviews, which until recently, was only accessible to travel professionals.

Travelers can now create their own pocket-sized guidebooks using information from ProfessionalTravelGuide.com - destination overviews, hotel information, things to see & do, places to dine, etc. - and add their own notes, travel information and photographs of landmarks and other points of interest if they like. Pocket Guidebooks can be created for a single destination or as many locations as the traveler chooses.

The application is fully collaborative, enabling groups of family and friends to work on the guides together. Anyone invited into the space can also create their own book. Pricing begins at $18.95.

If you would like to learn more, today's announcement from ProfessionalTravelGuide.com can be accessed here.

BigOven.com Launches Custom Cookbook

We launched a new cookbook publishing capability with BigOven.com today. BigOven is a social networking site about food that focuses on meal planning and recipe discovery.

Individual cooks and groups of family and friends can now go to BigOven.com to publish their own cookbooks from the Web site or BigOven's award-winning desktop recipe software.

It is now possible to build a BigOven Cookbook from:

• Your Personal Favorites or Site Favorites
• Search Results
• Any Cooking Group
• Recipes Contributed by Any Member

BigOven built the solution using SharedBook's API, which is available for any site to use.

Read what BigOven's CEO Steve Murch had to say about the launch here. Today's press release can be accessed here if you would like to learn more.

Thank you to Kristen Nicole of Mashable.com, Michale Cairns of PersonaNonData and Lynn Andriani of Publishers Weekly for helping us spread the word.

SharedBook and Random House Partner

We are in the process of announcing a partnership with Random House to offer a series of personalized book products, beginning with The Poky Little Puppy. In this case, it's possible to write a custom dedication and upload a child's photograph to the front of the book. The book is then printed on demand and sent directly to the address of your choice.

Michael Cairns of PersonaNonData had the chance to see one of the first samples, and as he noted here, the quality of the book is the same as you would expect from any found on the shelves of your local bookstore. We think the personalized version of The Poky Little Puppy is going to be a great gift - it's thoughtful and unique, and perhaps most of all - convenient! For more information, please go to GoldenBooks.com.

Thank you to everyone that has helped us spread the word to date: Kimberly Maul of The Book Standard and The Book Seller; Ron Hogan of GalleyCat; Kristen Nicole of Mashable; Michael Cader of Publishers Lunch; and Lynn Andriani and Jim Milliot of Publishers Weekly. We were excited to see that Eoin Purcell and John Kremer also mentioned the news.

Random House is a perfect example of how a traditional publishing company can use SharedBook's platform to engage more closely with their readers online, and to develop new revenue streams for existing materials. We look forward to introducing additional titles and personalization capabilities as the partnership progresses.

The First Tester

Today we launched our PayPal integration support. Starting from today, everyone can choose to pay securely for their own customized and personalized book via credit card or PayPal account.

Why am I telling you this? First, because I am proud of the team here that pulled this integration off amazingly fast (Alex, Veronica, this is my opportunity to say thanks for a job well done!).

Also, since I was the only one here in Israel with a PayPal account, I had the privilege of doing the first live purchase, to test the full cycle of integration. It is exciting to be the first one to use a new feature. It is exciting to check behind the scenes and see that the transaction went smoothly. And since I made my private blog book with Blog2Print, I was very excited to see my own personal book, with my beautiful kids (yes, I know I am biased J) smiling at me from every page.

Sometimes, it is really nice to be a tester, and even better to be the first tester. Today was just one of those days …

Speaking at the Gridley Conference Today

I am filling in for Caroline who was invited to present at Gridley & Company's 7th Annual Information, Marketing, Financial Technology and Internet Services Conference today. Gridley is a boutique investment bank that provides financial advisory services to companies in the Information Services industry. More than 350 senior level executives are expected to attend the event, representing 240 different public and private companies and private equity firms. Caroline will be delivering an overview on SharedBook early this afternoon.