Last night saw the launch of Spinebreakers, Penguin's brand new community site for teenagers. In internal meetings, at publishing industry conferences and on this blog we've long wrung our hands over the young readers we lose to video games, youtube and myspace and finally some of the folks here have tried to do something about it.
Over the last 9 months a hardworking team from Penguin and an equally hardworking panel of teenagers have been discussing, shaping and finetuning the Spinebreakers site. From the look and feel, to the colours, to the content itself, the teen panel have been involved in every stage of what was sometimes an ardous process. Authors have been interviewed (by teenagers), vodcasts and podcasts recorded and uploaded (by teenagers), alternative endings written and alternative covers drawn (by, yes you guessed it, teenagers).
As you can probably tell, Spinebreakers will be a hugely interactive site - teenagers everywhere are encouraged to send in audio, video, writing, alternative covers and basically just get involved. We know that internet users, and teenagers in particular, are not content to be passive consumers of content, they want to get on with it and actively create stuff and Spinebreakers will be a place where book related content in all formats will be welcomed, displayed and shared. If you are a creative teenager interested in books, or know one, get stuck in and pass on the link.
I think it is a hugely exciting project and I can't wait to see how it evolves. Congratulations to the Spinebreakers Crew and everyone involved in this.
Jeremy Ettinghausen
Digital Publisher
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