{"id":10761,"date":"2015-05-25T07:42:26","date_gmt":"2015-05-25T11:42:26","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.alsc.ala.org\/blog\/?p=10761"},"modified":"2025-06-04T15:25:57","modified_gmt":"2025-06-04T19:25:57","slug":"hot-dogs-get-your-hot-dogs","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.alsc.ala.org\/blog\/2015\/05\/hot-dogs-get-your-hot-dogs\/","title":{"rendered":"Hot Dogs, get your Hot Dogs"},"content":{"rendered":"

Galactic Hot Dogs<\/em>, that is! Cosmoe\u2019s Weiner Getaway<\/em> is the first book in a three part series written by Max Brallier and published by Aladdin, an imprint of Simon & Schuster.<\/p>\n

The book has taken off on Funbrain.com<\/a>, a popular gaming website for children that has been a launch pad for some of the biggest blockbuster hits in children\u2019s book publishing. Jeff Kinney\u2019s ever popular Diary of a Wimpy Kid <\/em>got its start there as a free book in 2004 and now has over 150 million copies in print.<\/p>\n

Other titles such as Rachel Renee Russell\u2019s Dork Diaries<\/em> series, Lincoln Pierce\u2019s Big Nate <\/em>and Brandon Mull\u2019s best-selling fantasy series The Beyonders<\/em> all of gaining wider audiences due to their popularity on Funbrain and its sister site Poptropica<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Galactic Hot Dogs<\/em> seems to be destined for the same success. More than six million children have read the book on Funbrain since its debut in the fall of 2013 when individual chapters were posted. What sets this apart is that more than a million children have played the story-based Galactic Hot Dogs<\/em> game that went live on Poptropica two months ago. Like many books that are popular on the site, it appeals to 8- to 12-year-olds who appreciate its kooky hero, Cosmoe, and its humorous, comic-strip-style illustrations.<\/p>\n

Recently, multiplatform books with online gaming components have become essential tools in the children\u2019s book publishing industry. They are clearly seeking to reach young readers who are migrating to digital and mobile reading. Sixty-seven percent of children between the ages of 2 and 13 read e-books, according to a report released in January by Digital Book World and PlayCollective, up from 54 percent in 2012.<\/p>\n

While many fear that sites such as Poptropica and Funbrain might detract from reading time, authors and publishers clearly seem to think differently.\u00a0Some publishers have found that interactive games can increase print sales rather than erode them. Scholastic\u2019s multiplatform game and book series, 39 Clues<\/em>, which started in 2008, has more than 17 million copies in print.<\/p>\n

Clearly there is core audience for this new books to gaming crossover market and they are buying the print books. I think this is definitely the next “big” thing in the children’s digital world.<\/p>\n

Allison Santos<\/p>\n

ALSC Digital Task Force<\/p>\n

Director, Princeton Children’s Book Festival<\/p>\n

Princeton Public Library, NJ<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Galactic Hot Dogs, that is! Cosmoe\u2019s Weiner Getaway is the first book in a three part series written by Max Brallier and published by Aladdin, an imprint of Simon & Schuster. The book has taken off on Funbrain.com, a popular gaming website for children that has been a launch pad for some of the biggest blockbuster hits in children\u2019s book publishing. Jeff Kinney\u2019s ever popular Diary of a Wimpy Kid got its start there as a free book in 2004 and now has over 150 million copies in print. Other titles such as Rachel Renee Russell\u2019s Dork Diaries series, Lincoln Pierce\u2019s Big Nate and Brandon Mull\u2019s best-selling fantasy series The Beyonders all of gaining wider audiences due to their popularity on Funbrain and its sister site Poptropica. Galactic Hot Dogs seems to be destined for the same success. More than six million children have read the book on Funbrain since…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":166,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_uf_show_specific_survey":0,"_uf_disable_surveys":false,"footnotes":"","_members_access_role":[],"_members_access_error":""},"categories":[271,210,141,22,24,208,81],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-10761","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-blogger-digital-content-task-force","category-books-2","category-children-technology","category-childrens-literature","category-digital-world","category-ereaders-and-ebooks","category-gaming"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.alsc.ala.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10761","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.alsc.ala.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.alsc.ala.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.alsc.ala.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/166"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.alsc.ala.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=10761"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.alsc.ala.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10761\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.alsc.ala.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=10761"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.alsc.ala.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=10761"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.alsc.ala.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=10761"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}