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Are you truly so uninformed that you think everything offline is dying? It's been consistently shown that there has been no decline in the sale of 'paper' books

Are you truly so uninformed that you think everything offline is dying? It's been consistently shown that there has been no decline in the sale of 'paper' books, and the e-book sales are currently an entirely independent market with no effect on sales in the traditional market. [Ed: Sorry the last statement was a little incorrect, it's actually been shown through companies like Tor that the release of some of their free e-books has actually boosted paper book sales; those e-books are really killing that old system!] If anything, book publishers have been seeing record sales of some books due to increased fan awareness and the ease of access to purchasing, like Amazon, thanks to the internet.

tialys 17y ago
Ok, admittedly the "dying industry" bit was hyperbole, but it irks me to no end that "old media" can't simply adapt. If it doesn't work like it's been working for the past 100 years, it must the end of the world. That kind of thinking is slowing progress, and causing all kinds of headaches for consumers more than anyone else. I would feel ripped off paying the same price for an E-book as I would for a paper book, and this is what customers are trying to tell publishers. The problem is, just like the music industry, change is scaring them away from making rational decisions to support the 'new' consumer model.
moe 17y ago
It's been consistently shown that there has been no decline in the sale of 'paper' books, and the e-book sales are currently an entirely independent market with no effect on sales in the traditional market. While I agree that his hyperbole was a bit over the top I also think that you're playing it down a bit too much. The e-ink technology is making its first babysteps just now but it's already clear that we'll have true e-paper (bendable, rollable displays) in the near future. Ten years from now you may still be able to buy dead-tree books. But I'm pretty sure they and especially newspapers and magazines will be on a sharp decline, in favor to just downloading the content to your personal reader device. Twenty years from now our kids will shake their heads about that past era of dead-tree books, just like today they wonder how we could ever exist without cellphones. A common, parental dialogue in 2029: "No search-function, no hyperlinks, no updates, no dictionary lookup? Are you kidding me, daddy?"

tialys 17y ago

Ok, admittedly the "dying industry" bit was hyperbole, but it irks me to no end that "old media" can't simply adapt. If it doesn't work like it's been working for the past 100 years, it must the end of the world. That kind of thinking is slowing progress, and causing all kinds of headaches for consumers more than anyone else. I would feel ripped off paying the same price for an E-book as I would for a paper book, and this is what customers are trying to tell publishers. The problem is, just like the music industry, change is scaring them away from making rational decisions to support the 'new' consumer model.

moe 17y ago

It's been consistently shown that there has been no decline in the sale of 'paper' books, and the e-book sales are currently an entirely independent market with no effect on sales in the traditional market. While I agree that his hyperbole was a bit over the top I also think that you're playing it down a bit too much. The e-ink technology is making its first babysteps just now but it's already clear that we'll have true e-paper (bendable, rollable displays) in the near future. Ten years from now you may still be able to buy dead-tree books. But I'm pretty sure they and especially newspapers and magazines will be on a sharp decline, in favor to just downloading the content to your personal reader device. Twenty years from now our kids will shake their heads about that past era of dead-tree books, just like today they wonder how we could ever exist without cellphones. A common, parental dialogue in 2029: "No search-function, no hyperlinks, no updates, no dictionary lookup? Are you kidding me, daddy?"