Amazon Kindle e-book downloads outsell paperbacks | Hacker News Reader

Amazon Kindle e-book downloads outsell paperbacks

bbc.co.uk

49 pointsmmavnn36 comments

There's one thing that scares me about the coming death of the physical books. When I was a kid there were a lot of books at home. Frequently, some book would catch my attention and I would read it (or try to read it, sometimes I was too young to understand some of them). It was not that I was always actively looking for something to read, it was just that books, being physical and visible all the time, were basically impossible to ignore. The fact that they looked different was important, in my opinion, to make me want to look at them more closely.

I don't see how that experience can be replicated today with electronic books, for my kids. I have bought a lot of books for the kindle since I got one, and it kinds of ticks me that Im actually depriving my kids of the real bookshelf experience I enjoyed so much, by not buying the physical version.

(sorry for the poor english)

I read many titles that a demographic "channel" might well never have presented to me.

And a book, once made, can take on a life of its own. Traveling to distant places, held in many hands.

DRM-ed ebooks are like a tethered bird. I fear for the freedom of the thoughts they contain.

I wish I could pay extra when buying a paperback and get the electronic edition "on loan" until the paperback arrives. This would be the best of both worlds, for me.

sod on "loan" I would like the option to have both thanks, I don't mind paying a £1 or so more than the physical copy is on its own but at the moment if I want both I have to buy both the physical and the digital copy. Like the BluRay+DVD packs that are available.

I share this exact concern as most of my favorite books as a kid were the ones I discovered on my dad's bookshelf: LOTR, Ray Bradbury, Issac Asimov, Arthur C. Clarke and lots of other science fiction.

My plan for my daughter is to give her an iPod touch (or maybe her own Kindle - they're getting so cheap) when she's old enough. I'll set it up with our family amazon account and she'll have access to all of the books I've already purchased.

I think we are going to have many new fascinating physical objects to catch our attention in the future. Just because many objects of the past (books) have been shrunk to fit in one little object does not mean we will not create entirely new ones. We haven't done it yet because we didn't have the space. Now that the bookshelf is empty, it will be filled with many new wonderful things.

People are creative. And people like stuff.

I think it's much easier to impulse buy e-books on the Kindle than it is to buy a paperback. You get instant gratification -- you see a book you want, pay for it, and you get it without having to travel anywhere.

This is especially potent if you're already reading a series; just go buy the next book in the series. Sometimes I'll find out about a book and then just grab my Kindle to get the book before I forget about it.

Instant purchase, instant gratification!

For me it is also a better delivery method. Living in Europe, it takes about 2 weeks for print books to arrive, then I need to go to post office to pick them up, I need to pay for the delivery, etc. It is all so much easier with the ebook. Moreover, I don't even own Kindle, and read my ebooks on the netbook or phone.

Yeah: English books + paying in "weak" dollars + no VAT tax + no waiting around for the Italian postal system is a huge win over any other method of getting books.

I still prefer real books, and if I lived somewhere with a good book store (like Powell's, or even Smith Family in Eugene), I'm not sure I'd use the Kindle quite so much.

Here in the UK, and with Amazon prime, I find the opposite is true. Ordering paper books they turn up by courier at my office the next day, usually before 10am.

Ok, so the cost if £1 more per book but speaking personally it's worth it :)

(I realise I am an outlier, though, maybe not on HN; spending upwards of £1,000/r on books)

At least you own your books and can sell or pass them to others. Not so for eBook licences 'purchased' from Amazon: http://zine.openrightsgroup.org/comment/2011/the-dummy%E2%80...

Same situation here in Canada, you pay for a book and wait 1-2 weeks before the postman will drop it at your door :).

Having a Kindle has changed everything, what I like most is that I can use my Kindle everywhere ... especially in metro and bus. I was able to port almost all my electronic books on Kindle.

I don't like so much the DRM protection of some editors, but you can find a lot of DRM free books these days.

I don't know... With the vast majority of books having the first chapter available for free, I usually end up only buying once I know I'll enjoy reading it.

The instant purchase, instant gratification part is particularly important. I ordered two books to brazil in dec 22 and they still haven't arrived. I've heard of, bought, and read many more books since, using the kindle for ipod touch.

I would be sold on the Kindle if I could read technical books easily. Over the past few years I have built quiet a collection of (legal) books in PDF format, only for them to be unreadable on my Kindle and impossible to convert to another format without damaging code, graphs, equations, etc.

For novels, it's a fantastic bit of kit, but outside of that the dead tree format isn't so dead.

They're not "unreadable" on the Kindle, but the Kindle (especially the smaller models) are pretty non-optimal for using tech reference books in PDF format.

previous discussion here:

http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=2149521

While I always felt that this was inevitable, I think this went much faster than what I would have anticipated.

I guess the advantages of ebooks (immediate availability, much easier purchase process) have helped to convert people more quickly and made the converts buy more books in general (certainly happened to me).

Now let's hope that this success is seen by other industries too (Console Gaming, Movies) where they would still do everything possible to have you buy physical media.

Well, the transition isn't over yet. Amazon is comparing their own sales of paperbacks to their sales of Kindle books. But Amazon's share of the ebook market is a lot larger than their share of the paperback market. The industry as a whole is still selling substantially more paperbacks than ebooks. Or at least they were, as of fourth quarter last year.

Exactly, as well, the book market is the combination of hardcover + paperback, so the comparison is lacking in that feature as well.

In July they announced that ebook sales had outpaced hardcover sales, so while sales probably haven't exceeded paperback + hardcover sales, it's certainly on pace to do so soon.

In the article they say that paperback sales are still growing. It almost looks like ebooks are increasing the overall demand for books and are cannibalizing print books less than expected -- though without the actual sales data we can't be sure. Of course, the brick-and-mortar book stores have been closing a lot of stores recently, which is another explanation for continuing increased paperback demand.

I hope this spurs publishers on to making electronic versions (not necessarily Kindle) as standard. I for one have no interest in dead tree books anymore. I read serial works (typically fiction) on an ebook reader or my iPad and my iPad is fantastic for technical books.

Sadly the range of Kindle books is still too small as the publishers (pretty much every content distributor actually) is stuck in the dark ages.

Sadly the range of Kindle books is still too small as the publishers (pretty much every content distributor actually) is stuck in the dark ages.

They need to get their act together. If there is no good 'offical' ebook, people will easily turn to piracy. If that gets established as the norm for normal people, the book publishers will lose out.

I've been following this for some time, if you want more information on it this is one of the best blogs out there detailing numbers between paper/e-publishing:

http://jakonrath.blogspot.com/

I don't understand this -- I buy ebooks because it's too complicated to buy physical books from my country. If it would be as convenient as the US I would buy mostly paperback and just for a select few the ebook version.

I wonder if Amazon is counting all the free downloads? I know I've purchased one Kindle book, but downloaded maybe 20 free ones from Amazon.

I'll be more impressed when the e-book revenue catches paperbacks.

"Amazon announced that in the US since the start of the year it had sold 115 e-book downloads for every 100 paperback books, even excluding its downloads of free books." (highlight is mine)

Part of me doesn't want to believe it. Mainly because ebooks are too restrictive (can't resell) and overpriced for my liking.

Also, I might be nitpicking, but it seems like ebooks only beat 'paperback books'. In that article they make a distinction between 'paperback books' and 'hardcovers'. So ebook sales haven't surpassed all physical paper books yet. The title is correct, but could be misleading if you assume 'paperback' is just generic physical book.

How could it be any other way? The Kindle starts with no books. People already own paperbacks. To fill up a Kindle requires buying Kindle books. To fill up a bookshelf requires nothing as most people who read already have full bookshelves.

If people are buying books to fill up the available space then you're right. If people are buying books to read them then you probably aren't.

I'd guess that most people are buying books to read them.

My own experience with devices that can be filled up leads me to believe that there will always be an initial increase in buying rate because of the newness and emptiness of the device.

The rate at which you buy books to read can vary. If it increases, that doesn't mean you're buying books just to fill up a device. You're still buying them to read, just faster. I would imagine people who get a brand new device for reading likely increase their reading time too.

Kindle outsells print for new books too.

The problem for me is that e-books cost the same as paperbacks. And personally I like to have a copy to share. With the ability to share and lend books alleviates some of this issue. But I still think the publishers are holding it back.

Interestingly, net sales increased by 40% in 2010. Amazon is still close to being a not-for-profit organization, but they appear to be growing faster than Google.

what's the data? is this the pie growing or is digital actually eating into physical book sales in a zero sum game, and to what degree?

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