When I talk to people about why learning to convey ideas with pictures is a critical business skill in today's world, I often cite the fact that pictures transcend the language barrier. As we work with increasingly global teams, the likelihood that more than a few languages will be spoken on our project is increasing every day.
I learned the power of pictures as a business tool myself when living and working in Russia, France, Switzerland, Thailand, and Hong Kong. While I didn't arrive in each place speaking the local language, I was able to communicate pretty effectively with simple pictures.
So I am especially pleased with the international response there has been to THE BACK OF THE NAPKIN. I always thought the book had a chance to do well outside the United States, and the folks at Penguin have really come through.
Here is the initial list of non-US editions and publishing dates of THE BACK OF THE NAPKIN:
Taiwan
Yuan-Lion
Oct. 2008
(Already a bestseller in Taiwan!)
South Korea
Book 21
Oct. 2008
Japan
Kodansha
Feb. 2009
Russia
Eksmo Publishing House
Feb. 2009
United Kingdom
Cyan
Feb. 2009
Spain
Edigrable SA
March 2009
Germany
Finanzbuch Verlag GMBH
May 2009
Romania
SC Publica
May 2009
Colombia (for Latin America)
Gruppo Editorial Norma
June 2009
Turkey
Kapital Medya Hizmetleri AS
June 2009
Portugal
Editora Pergaminho LDA
Sept. 2009
France
ESF Editeur
Sept. 2009
China
Citic Publishing House
Oct. 2009
Poland
Helion SA
Oct. 2009
Indonesia
Ufuk Press
Sept. 2009
there are different views on this topic
I think what best we can do is tell it first and then give a review of weight
Posted by: generic viagra | April 14, 2010 at 02:26 PM
While I didn't arrive in each place speaking the local language, I was able to communicate pretty effectively with simple pictures.
Posted by: buy viagra | March 26, 2010 at 09:41 AM
Congratulations for your success!
I'm reading you book in English, but you should try to publish it in Brazil. It's already translated to Portuguese from Portugal, with some adaptation you could easily get into Brazilian market which has a large public in this field.
Cheers!
Posted by: Bernarda Calcado | February 01, 2009 at 04:25 AM
Grabbed a Chinese (in Taipei) copy off the shelf last week and since then attached to it, made a mindmap and lot of clips out of it, thanks for providing such a useful skills.
Btw, the Chinese version did look very nice with those detailed navigation text here and there, very thoughtful, made me wanting to buy an English version ;)
Jeremy.
Posted by: Jeremy | December 24, 2008 at 06:55 AM
It is quite a good news, I'm looking forward to your book in chinese.
Posted by: Liu's chart blog | December 18, 2008 at 06:05 AM
Congrats on going global...
Could you please correct Colombia's name? The country's name is with O, not with U (this is a very common mistake).
Maybe a way to represent it visually is by writing the country's name like this:
Col'O'mbia
Posted by: Andres | December 17, 2008 at 08:29 AM
I'm looking forward to it here in the UK. I've been following the blog a while, asked for the book as a birthday present back in November and was dismayed when told I couldn't have it.
Why couldn't the UK version get released at the same time? I'm pretty sure we could cope with a "color" book instead of a "colour" one.
Must be annoying for authors too.
Dan, if you ever get a chance could you write a blog post on using drawings in books -- especially technical books? Cheers.
(Sorry if it's already in the book -- I'll find out in Feb.)
Posted by: David Barnes | December 17, 2008 at 06:58 AM