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Submitted via IRC for TheMightyBuzzard
New data suggest that the reading public is ditching e-books and returning to the old fashioned printed word.
Sales of consumer e-books plunged 17% in the U.K. in 2016, according to the Publishers Association. Sales of physical books and journals went up by 7% over the same period, while children's books surged 16%.
The same trend is on display in the U.S., where e-book sales declined 18.7% over the first nine months of 2016, according to the Association of American Publishers. Paperback sales were up 7.5% over the same period, and hardback sales increased 4.1%.
"The print format is appealing to many and publishers are finding that some genres lend themselves more to print than others and are using them to drive sales of print books," said Phil Stokes, head of PwC's entertainment and media division in the U.K.
Stokes said that children's book have always been more popular in print, for example, and that many people prefer recipe books in hardback format.
Source: http://money.cnn.com/2017/04/27/media/ebooks-sales-real-books/index.html
(Score: 2) by physicsmajor on Wednesday May 03 2017, @01:00AM (3 children)
I agree with most of your points, save the alternate Ebook reader hardware. There are two options which are fantastic in their respective categories.
The all-around amazing ergonomics, cheap-enough-not-to-use-a-case option: Nook Simple Touch. Not the glowlight, the original. This thing is overbuilt and looks a little weird, until you hold it and realize the ergonomics are way better than the other thin slabs out there. It's so durable you can - and should - give it to your kids. It will take their abuse. The resolution is high enough. I have read millions of pages on one of these. Don't underestimate them, just pick one up off Craigslist for almost nothing and get to reading. Handles all ePubs.
If you want a more "premium" experience, look at the Kobo Aura H2O or Kobo Aura One. These are at or beyond Kindle quality, except are built to accept any format you care to throw at them. Premium, high resolution screens. In my opinion, they look sharper but are actually not as good as the venerable Nook Simple Touch for ergonomics longer term. However, they can handle PDFs and are certainly slicker. Not sure I'd get my kids one of these, though.
There are other decent options as well, the point is "Kindle or nothing" is a myopic view of the market. I'd argue both of the above more than deliver on the promise for recreational reading. However, I'd agree that for PDF viewing/journals, etc., ereaders still don't cut it.
(Score: 2) by jmorris on Wednesday May 03 2017, @01:51AM (1 child)
I own a Nook Simple Touch, from before the Glowlight. Will probably have to replace the battery in another year or two. Discontinued and no longer available in most places, either version. Which is why I said what I did, you have to know alternatives exist and seek them out, usually online, because nobody is marketing anything except Kindle any longer. Kindle won't read epub, lacks a memory slot or any simple (not involving Amazon's services) way of loading content.
Oh, and the Nook blows for anything but paragraph level formatting. Forget tables and it sometimes screws up simple blockquotes. As I said, for reading a typical novel from begin to end it is good. Forget about any other use of it because you are rolling the dice on making it all the way through, especially if you lack an alternate reader for the book in case you hit a problem. I don't have Windows and won't install the Nook app on my phone (it was horrible at keeping the phone out of deep sleep) so it means avoid B&N's DRM on anything that might possibly be a problem.
(Score: 2) by AndyTheAbsurd on Wednesday May 03 2017, @03:21PM
Do the current-revision Kindles not show up as a USB mass storage device when plugged in to a PC, and allow you to place PDF or .mobi files on them? I know that the ones I've handled did - but that's limited to a 3rd-gen Keyboard and a not-sure-what-but-definitely-prior-to-current Glow.
Please note my username before responding. You may have been trolled.
(Score: 2) by richtopia on Wednesday May 03 2017, @01:23PM
I switched from the Nook Glo to the Kobo Aura when the Nook finally bit the dust after about five years. Both gave good reading experiences however the OS is different: I rooted the Android Nook but it was stuck on 2.1, so most apps didn't work. Even rooted the battery life was terrible, with the device always being drained after a month of sitting in standby. The Kobo runs Linux but you cannot tell. The battery management is vastly superior, I now have to charge a couple times a year and don't worry to check the battery level when packing for a trip, even when using the backlight.
I haven't used a Kindle so I cannot compare it, but I am biased against Amazon so I probably won't. Anyway, I'm quite sold on the Kobo devices now.