RH new digital imprints

[kaal]

Haven't seen this elsewhere and just saw it tweeted...
Random House have launched 3 new digital imprints:

To the already-existing LOVESWEPT imprint for romance and women’s fiction, RHPG will add the following digital-only imprints: ALIBI, for mystery/suspense readers; HYDRA, for sci-fi/fantasy enthusiasts; and FLIRT, for the rapidly-growing YA and college-age New Adult audiences.

Might be worth a punt in a bit...

 

[MattC]

Mmmm. Not so sure. I'd check the details of the publishing contract first. Macmillan mooted a similar thing over a year ago to replace Macmillan New Writing - reception swung between cool to hostile (and that was from their own authors too). The problem is the royalties: the percentage has been historically poor from the Big Six. And it's usually Net not Gross, so once the book is discounted you're looking at maybe 20p per ebook sale on a book that has an rrp of £4.99 but heavily discounted. You don't have any control over the rrp or the discounting. Nor do you get much publicity - you have to do that yourself.
What you do get is valuable editorial input and a decent copy-writer. To some writers that might be enough to commit.

 

[MattC]

I should add that the chances of making much money out of this is almost zero because of the lack of hard copy sales to back up ebook publication. In similar schemes, you are almost entirely locked into a clause that means the publisher owns the rights to publish in hard copy but in most cases won't so you're stuck until the contract expires (which it won't do because ebooks are treated differently - ebooks don't go out of print like normal publishing contracts stipulate).
Again, it depends on the details of the contract, but RH like any other publisher are looking to make money out of the author not the other way around. But if you are not in this to make money and require professional editing and have no technical knowledge to create an ebook yourself, this might be an option.

 

[Montero]

Nor do you get much publicity - you have to do that yourself.
.

I was under the impression that is generally the case anyway these days, or have I got that wrong?

Angry Robot for example are looking for authors to have blogs and websites etc.