Ebook Trends: The Year of Living Digitally

One scenario for resale could involve capturing a portion of secondary market revenue by the publisher and author—something that is impossible in the print world. However, the technical barriers to such a transaction, combined with the proprietary nature of competitive e­book platforms, and the short-term strategies of larger publishers, make this approach highly unlikely in the short term.

Conclusions

Perhaps the single greatest barrier to increased e­book adoption is the newness of the medium itself, and its domination by proprietary technology companies. The ereading experience is anything but uniform, as a cursory look at the many apps and reading devices will reveal. Over time, certain aspects of the user experience will become more uniform, making it appealing to a wider audience. Even some of the restrictions imposed by aggressive players like Amazon and Apple may in time yield to public pressure, and the needs of readers and researchers—which have not changed since the invention of reading.

Until then, however, e­books will remain a disruptive force—favoring innovative authors, publishers and resellers, and increasingly dominating the habits of technically savvy readers. x

John Parsons (john@intuideas.com) is an independent writer, researcher and analyst in the publishing and printing industries. He is the co-author of BISG’s Consumer Attitudes Toward E-Book Reading, and the former Editorial Director of The Seybold Report.

Read this story in our digital edition, or download Book Business' iOS app to get free access to all our great magazine content on your tablet.

1. Pew Internet & American Life Project; bit.ly/ZDqqKE
2. BookStats (www.bookstats.org) reports on revenue and units sold by publishers to resale channels, not on consumer purchases.

3. Student Attitudes Toward Content in Higher Education; bit.ly/hYzZWF

4. Consumer Attitudes Toward E-Book Reading; bit.ly/6P50bX

5. These numbers reflect non-exclusive device use.