Earlier this year we gave a broad prediction that 2009 would end up being the year of the e-book, and that this year would be the year when e-readers took their hold and found mass market appeal. We made some broad speculations, based on the trends still booming from the new release of the Kindle 2 and it’s endorsement by Oprah.
Now that 2009 is coming quietly to a close, we can look back on the past year and see if our predictions were right, all along, or if we had been caught up in the e-reader media blitz that had been chugging along at the time.
Our main prediction was that 2009 would be the year that e-readers would hit the same level of consumer penetration that the i-Pod had a few years before. Had this happened? Both yes and no. Take a look and see why…
Was 2009 the Year of the E-book?
With Oprah’s backing of the Kindle 2, the launch of the Kindle DX and the recent launch (and controversy) of the Nook, everything seemed lined up for a stellar performance. E-book sales were on the rise yet again, will print publishing was still producing massive losses, leading most to speculate the future of the book was electronic.
Yet, problems plagued the e-reader market practically from the start. Kindle users complained that their Kindle 1’s were obsolete too fast, and didn’t want to buy a whole new device only a year or so later. Barnes and Nobles got sued for stealing another company’s design for the Nook, and the Sony PRS-700 had more glare and smaller battery life.
Add in a recession that’s cutting across the world and getting rid of most people’s disposable income, and the e-reader market seemed doomed to failure. Yet, the end of the year looks very bright. Kindle is outselling all expectations, the Nook has sold out completely and most tech magazines are saying that e-readers will be the gift to buy for the end of the year.
So, on the whole, the e-reader market has been a huge success. And by the end of Christmas, we could see it reaching the same level of popularity as the i-Pod.
2010 and Beyond
Right now thoughts of the future of the e-reader and e-books in general (as well as e-ink and e-paper applied to this device) seems to be split into two camps: those who think that the future looks bright, and those that think e-paper is a waste of time.
The main difference between these two? One is based on statistics, and the other is based on emotion. The nay-sayers only speculate, they haven’t used e-paper technology or e-ink, and claim that you should just buy a netbook instead. These people, oddly enough, are also in the publishing industry.
The people who say the future of publishing is in e-paper and e-ink have a lot of solid statistics to back it up. E-books themselves continue to grow in sales, with a total of $50 million dollars in sales for the third quarter of 2009. That’s a 400% increase of the third quarter of 2008.
And the firm mediaIDEAS recently released a report that said that in 2010, the number of e-readers sold (the device to read e-books) will rise to 10 million in sales, and by 2020 e-reader sales will hit with 446 million units sold globally.
When combined with the lagging sales of print books, and the rising sales of e-books, it seems that we’re ready for an explosive holiday shopping season. 2009 hasn’t quite been the year of the e-book quite yet, but it just might be, very soon.
2009, e-paper, e-readers
Agree, e-readers market has been hot this year. For sure their popularity will grow even more in 2010.
By the way, thanks for the great articles you write. Epapercentral is now in “Digital Book Readers TOP 5″ that I have composed and published recently in my blog.