The Friday Project

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The Friday Project (TFP) is a London-based independent publishing house founded by Paul Carr and Clare Christian in June 2004. It evolved out of The Friday Thing (TFT), an internet newsletter taking an offbeat look at the week's politics, media activities and general current events. TFT's sister project, London by London was also absorbed. [1]

The Friday Project is separated into three distinct 'imprints' - Friday Books which focusses on "turning the web's finest sites into the world's best books"[2], Friday Interactive (formerly Friday Online) which looks after TFT and TFP's other online publishing interests and most recently Friday Audio which produces audio content including CDs and podcasts.

Investors in the company include former Random Century and Orion CEO, Anthony Cheetham while global sales and distribution is handled through a partnership with Pan Macmillan. [3]

In 2005, The Friday Project established a formal 'first look' arrangement with Sarah Jessica Parker's production company, Pretty Matches Productions. The deal gives Pretty Matches first option on the US television rights for all Friday Project titles.

In 2006, The Friday Project announced that it had hired Scott Pack[4], then Buying Manager at bookshop chain Waterstones, as TFP's Commercial Director. Pack took up the post in September 2006 at the end of a six-month notice period. In his job at Waterstones, Pack had been described by many commentators as 'the most powerful man in publishing'[5] for his ability to decide which new titles will be successful.

Friday Books published its first three titles in Autumn 2005[6] - The Holy Moly! Rules of Modern Life by Holy Moly!, 2005: Blogged edited by Tim Worstall and the second edition of London by London: the insiders' guide edited by Graham Pond. A total of 30 titles will be published in 2006, including a series of Popjustice books, written by Peter Robinson and illustrated by David Whittle, The B3ta book of Sick Jokes by Rob Manuel of B3ta.com, A Year in the Life of The Man Who Fell Asleep by Greg Stekelman and Blood, Sweat & Tea (Real life adventures in an inner-city ambulance) by Tom Reynolds. The latter book was the first Friday Books title to be also published online under a Creative Commons licence. Further Creative Commons titles were released online in November 2006.

Some of the online publications undertaken by Friday Interactive include:

  • The Friday Thing (TFT) – a weekly newsletter produced each Friday featuring content about events of the past week
  • London by London – a guide to London written by everyday Londoners (versions being planned for Brighton, Cardiff, Edinburgh, Glasgow and Manchester); a book version was the inaugural publication of TFP's book publishing arm, Friday Books
  • Vox – a daily blog about the world of publishing, written by Paul Carr and Clare Christian
  • Haiknews – a summary of the news, presented in the form of a haiku
  • The TFP Talk Forums – a "chat / clambake / colloquium" where the readers of The Friday Thing discuss the news
  • Still Warm – email obituaries

Ealing Studios bought the rights for a television show version of the Friday Thing in 2003. This has yet to go into production, and should not be confused with The Friday Night Project, a Channel 4 programme. The Friday Thing often includes some of the more idiotic emails from fans of the The Friday Night Project who confuse the two websites.

In December 2006, it was reported [7] that Carr - along with Online Editor, Graham Pond, had left The Friday Project with Carr leading a buy-out of the company's Interactive arm.

[edit] Trivia

  • WAWIBF is an abbreviation frequently used in The Friday Thing (see above), which is produced by The Friday Project. Debate about the meaning of the abbreviation has been widespread, with several members of the public writing in to ask and constant cryptic references to it in the newsletter itself. WAWIBF stands for "What A Week It's Been For...", and is generally applied to amusing stories about individuals who have endured particularly gruelling, interesting or otherwise noteworthy events and/or media exposure in the previous week.
  • TTEOSE is an abbreviation popularised by The Friday Thing (see above), standing for "The Terrible Events Of September Eleventh".

[edit] Footnotes

  1. ^ The Friday Project.
  2. ^ Reinventing the wheel part 94. The Guardian (2006-04-30).
  3. ^ Friday Project Media.
  4. ^ The Bookseller. The Guardian (2006-04-15).
  5. ^ Authors try to turn Waterstone tide. The Guardian (2005-11-27).
  6. ^ Friday Books.
  7. ^ Paul Carr leaves the Friday Project.

[edit] External links

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