Friday, November 7, 2008

Recession could hasten adoption of ebooks

One immediate consequence of Obama's victory was the boost in sales for newspapers. So now we have confirmation that print is not dead -- at least as far as collectors are concerned.

This merely reinforces my belief that the long-term future of books lies in bifurcated markets: Half in cheap or reasonably priced e-books and the other half in high cost collectable volumes (be it what it may – art, photography, or even leather bound volumes of fiction).

The days of mass merchandising $35 hardcover topical nonfiction books and midlist fiction are, as we all know, ultimately numbered. Don’t believe me – just ask Harper UK CEO Victoria Barnsley. She just told the London School of Economics as much in a speech earlier this week.

The economy might just hasten the change: Those $35 hardcovers start to look like a real luxury in a recession.

No, it won't happen immediately ($350 Kindles and Sony e-readers also look like luxuries), but you can bet a whole lot more people are going to give them a try. There will be converts, guaranteed.

3 comments:

Andrew Wilkins said...

Thanks for using "bifurcated" in a sentence, Ed. It's made my day!

sumitgupta008 said...

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vernongetzler said...

Hat’s off. Well done, as we know that “hard work always pays off”, after a long struggle with sincere effort it’s done.

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