As you may or may not know, the battle between print and ebooks may be over. And the winner is print.
Pew Research Center just released the results of their survey taken earlier this year that puts the market share of ebooks even lower than the generally accepted 30%. It’s in the twenties. And it’s not rising.
Print also isn’t rising, but the world of publishing would be perfectly fine with print making up anywhere from 65%-75% of the market. Publishers might even be ecstatic. A few years ago it looked as though the Kindle and ebooks would send print books to their ultimate demise. But that looks about as likely as me becoming president.
What do you think of the results of this survey? It’s not something that surprises me one bit.
Johnny Reads 
It must be the format or hardware of an ebook. I prefer print books myself, but I think that there has to be some kind of change in the way we read in the future. The current ebook isn’t it.
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I also prefer print. And I imagine that print will become obsolete at some point, but there’s nothing in today’s market that suggests it’ll be soon. Or that ebooks of today will be the reason.
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I only read print, but not because of a prejudice against ebooks per se. I just can’t be bothered to have yet another device in my house that needs charging 🙂
As long as people keep reading I don’t care how the words are delivered to them
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Hm. Well people are reading. Maybe not as many books as before, but they’re still reading.
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I think, considering everything else there is to do these days, that’s the best we can expect 🙂
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Yep.
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A few years ago, when ebooks became practical, publishers threw everything at the ebook market to see what would stick. Turns out, not everything sells well digitally. When it comes to fiction, most people still want a print copy.
But many short, nonfiction books can only be found as $2-3 ebooks, and that is attractive to people looking to learn something quick. Erotica – which one can read discreetly on their e-device without anyone realizing what they’re reading – is more at home in the ebook market too. So I think ebooks have just settled comfortably into their niches and we’re not going to see a huge rise or fall in those percentages for awhile. The ebook categories that sell will keep on selling, while fiction will keep doing its thing in print.
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I know. We’ve had this discussion a couple times before.
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I prefer print. I never read from a e reader, but I have read books on the computer and I don’t prefer it. The idea of looking at a screen for too long bothers my eyes, although I’m sure e readers have light adjustments. I can see from an economical standpoint how e books can be favorable, but I just couldn’t catch on to them.
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Economical standpoint? Are you talking about the prices or not having to store the books? Cause they’re usually more than the paperback edition and usually even the same price as the hardcover.
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I must have not been paying attention to e book prices lately–I thought they were cheaper than paper backs. If that’s the case, then I guess their only (or primary) benefit is storage space.
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I don’t know if they’re mostly more expensive or not, but for new releases they almost always are.
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Yes! Happy to hear…books are best on paper ❤
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Books are best when read. 😊
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haha, always a clever one 😉
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Well of course. 😊
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