Publishers are invited to register their participation in the program and upload Australian books to be part of it. For storytimes, we need quality titles which are suited to the pre-school age group, with great illustrations and diverse themes.
Participating public libraries pay a small subscription to be part of the program and have access to the titles on the book list and make recordings of them reading the book and post it to their online channels.
Each recording of a book will mean a payment to you, which you can share with your authors and illustrators. Payments are annual in January and during the rest of the year you will see extra sales of your books as libraries buy them to add to their storytime collections.
Find out the experience and thoughts of publishers, authors and illustrators after the first six months of the pilot by downloading this survey report.
How to register
Publisher registrations are now closed for 2022.
‘While it is wonderful to have such abundance of titles on the list, there needs to be more titles available for toddlers and pre-schoolers. Books with rhyming words, large colourful pictures and humour – stories that make kids laugh – are always great for Online Storytime. We are trying to make our online sessions as interactive and engaging as possible for the little ones who shouldn’t be in front of a screen for too long. We want children to forget they are looking at a screen and have an experience as close to an in-person library session as we can get.’
Payments
Payments are allocated according to a very simple model.
- We track the number of recordings of each title. This will give us a total number of recordings.
- We divide the net total subscription dollars by the total number of recordings, giving us a dollar value per recording figure.
- We multiply the number of recordings of each title by the cents per recording figure, giving us a value for each title.
- We provide each publisher with a statement showing the dollar figure for each title (to help you distribute cash to authors and illustrators) and we transfer the total sum for all your titles to your nominated bank account by EFT in January, when we have the full data about which titles have been recorded.
FAQs
Why is it good for the book industry?
The main benefit for picture book publishers, authors and illustrators and bookshops will be the direct marketing channel to families with young children – but there will also be a useful sum of cash transferred back to publishers and creators from the library subscriptions, and libraries which don’t have some of the books in their collection already may well buy them from booksellers.
How do we know who uses which books?
ALIA provides full transparency about the books used, the funds received and passed on. ALIA monitors and reports on the usage by libraries each quarter. These reports are published on this website.
When will publishers be paid?
There is an annual payment. This is made in January, to account for the subscriptions and usage in the previous 12 months.
How will authors and illustrators be paid?
Publishers will make payments to the creators based on their own contract arrangements.
What happens to copyright?
The copyright in the publications remains with the publishers. Libraries only have copyright of the recording of the virtual storytime session.
Where can I find more information?
Contact us at storytime@alia.org.au.