That's why this eBookReader interests me.
Posted on 07/20/2010 1:19:19 PM PDT by abb
The Amazon.com Kindle e-reader and bookstore have reached a "tipping point," the company said Monday, with Kindle titles outselling hardcover books on the massive online marketplace for the first time.
"We've reached a tipping point with the new price of Kindle--the growth rate of Kindle device unit sales has tripled since we lowered the price from $259 to $189," Amazon founder and CEO Jeff Bezos said in an announcement release, referring to last month's price drop for the device. "In addition, even while our hardcover sales continue to grow, the Kindle format has now overtaken the hardcover format. Amazon.com customers now purchase more Kindle books than hardcover books--astonishing, when you consider that we've been selling hardcover books for 15 years and Kindle books for 33 months."
And Kindle titles continue to outpace hardcovers, statistics from Amazon showed. In the past three months, 143 Kindle books were sold for every 100 hardcovers, but when that time frame is narrowed to a month, it's 180 Kindle books for every 100 hardcovers. Total e-book sales tripled from the first half of 2009 to the first half of 2010.
This comes despite months' worth of claims of naysayers who speculated that Apple's sophisticated iPad might render obsolete e-readers like the Kindle. But with prices higher in Apple's iBooks store than for many Kindle titles, and a Kindle app available for both the iPad and iPhone, the supposed death of the Kindle seems far less imminent. Some have even surmised that the discrepancies between the devices may play to Amazon's hand rather than Apple's.
Amazon is slated to announce its second-quarter earnings on Thursday, and analysts are speculating that it'll post an extremely strong quarter.
LOL, thanks. I was thinking some sort of software program. :)
No it would not, share the Kindle.
Yeah I know. I even had a side business going for awhile doing the same thing for people when the bookstore was late on ordering books for our class.
Paid for a year’s tuition that way, and the bookstore couldn’t get angry at me because they screwed up big time. Their books never did come, and we still needed to do the work, so.
The Hack Holland books are the ones I read...great Texas stuff...magritte
I got my Kindle DX for Daddoo’s day last year, and I love it. I read newspapers and magazines more than books, and it’s excellent for that. Unless you like advertisements. The Kindle editions only have the text.
I’ve had to send too much time in Dr’s waiting rooms these days, and it’s nice to have that one thin item to bring with me. Problem is, I rarely get to read it because people are always asking me about it...lol
It takes a couple of hours to recharge the Kindle, and it can last for a week.
I'd say the most obscure title can sell a couple hundred, even if its just friends and family. If tens of thousands of titles sell several hundred each it all adds up.
If this were true across the board an author like Stephen King (for example only, I didn't ask him) would say his sales last month were more than half e-books. Publishers are very stingy with their sales numbers however individual bestselling authors who I have in fact asked, report e-book sales are presently somewhere between 1% and 3% of print sales. So something is out of whack here.
As a writer myself, I've paid a lot of attention to this issue over the years. Based on many discussions and observations, I'm comfortable saying that the vast majority of self-pubbed authors can only dream of sales in the hundreds. I believe most are in the dozens, if that much.
And yes, publishers are very tight-lipped about sales, but maybe some significant author will step forward in the near future and actually put a percentage number forth on e-copy vs. hard copy.
Before you jump to the Kindle, you may really wanna look at the lowly iPad. It can run Kindle applications, so any book you can buy on Kindle, you can view on the iPad. And there is a Barnes and Noble app, as well as iBooks. This doesn’t begin to cover the other features (10-12 hr battery life) such as watching movies, music, surfing the net, email, viewing pictures (and edititing them), ect. Stuff that neither the Nook or Kindle can do - oh yes, and the iPad does them in beautiful IPS color.
My complaint (and this is really my view) is that Kindle, Nook and all e-Books are too expensive! Consider, with paperback or hardcover books you have the cost of printing, the cost of paper, the cost of freight, the storage and logistical costs and the expensive ‘shelf-space’. This all costs money, requires human effort and tangible shipping costs.
Meanwhile, the lowly e-book is the same base material the publisher delivers to the book printint company. It weighs NOTHING, it is trasnferred from a small file on a hard drive somewhere to your device (or account). The same file may be copied a virtually unlimited number of times.
Same advertizing costs, but zero shipping, zero printing, zero storage, zero shelf-space, zero stocking
Yet, the e-book is almost the same price as a tangible book.
Go figure.
The iPad apps (Kindle, Barnes and Noble, iBooks, ect) all have the ability to change the font, the font size as well as the color of the print and the color of the page to virtually anything you want.
I too have the old eyes - so I bump the font size up a notch or two... makes reading without my $3 readers a pure pleasure.
I’ve got the iPad; and have never regretted it for a moment. And, depending upon which model you get, they aren’t that much more (but they ARE more) than the competition. The good news is that while the Kindle/Nook all are basically eBook readers, the iPad is virtually as limitless as your notebook in it’s capabilities.
I’m generally tech-friendly, but I gotta say my luddite tendencies come out when it comes to books. I like having a book in my hands when I read (usually a paperback, as I’m far too cheap to buy hardcovers :-) ).
My wife is an author with 14 bestsellers in print. I am able to check her sales at any moment. I've seen the numbers of other bestselling authors she is close to, some really major authors. I'm telling you with my hand on my heart, e-book sales are about 3% of popular fiction across the board, right now, today.
Thank you. I appreciate the input and info.
I figure paper will co-exist for 4 to 12 more years, then be a niche product.
Sharp is now releasing a solar powere e-reader, expect the non illuminated serious reader market to go that way, while ever more powerful phone/tablet convergence devices fill the needs of casual readers.
Dell Streak & iphone 4
A large part of the reading market already carries a suitable device for casual reading.
Congrats to your wife and thanks for the info. What genre is she in?
MM
Suspense.
I used to read the ones set in Louisiana. Can’t remember the name of the main character now. He can write but he increasingly kept putting in his anti-Republican crap till I finally quit reading him.
Yes, if you mean that the printed page will eventually go the way of the silver halide (film) photograph.
But that's not what I think of when I hear 'dinosaur media'.
I got a Kindle for Christmas, and love it.
It is a great thing to be able to carry over eighty titles in a slim package. Not to mention I can download for free many of my favorite classic titles.
The bad thing is it is a temporary technology. I have books that were owned by my grandmother, that are still readable. My daughter will not be able to use the Kindle as it will wear out.
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