Nick Hornby on ebooks
Nick Hornby has written his thoughts on ebooks at the Penguin blog.
He makes some points that are fairly obvious and have been talked about plenty of times - like the high cost of an ebook reader, and the fact that people are quite attached to physical books in a way they were never attached to CDs.
He does make a couple of points that I have not seen much discussion about, concerning comparisons between the success of mp3 players and the potential growth of ebook readers.
First, when people buy their first mp3 player, they probably already have a considerable collection of CDs that can be added to the player immediately. People can’t do this with books they already own in hard copy. Sure they can download free copies of many public domain titles, but that won’t include the majority of titles on most people’s shelves.
The other point he makes is simply that people don’t read that much. Fair point. The benefit of buying a device for several hundred dollars so you can carry around lots and lots of books is limited if you don’t read lots and lots of books. Across the population, people do more music listening than reading.
He makes fair points, but I still believe the ebook industry will continue to grow. It’s not going to be an overnight thing where we all stop buying paper books overnight, but gradually the ebook market will grow. I actually wonder if there is more potential in non-fiction and text books than fiction.
I have said before that Amazon getting in on the act with the Kindle is a big deal for the format and I still believe that. It might not be a runaway success and it is still too expensive, but I think it is a big deal. Personally though, I am unlikely to get right into it until reader prices drop (my Treo screen still feels too small) and my library starts lending ebooks.
