Sales of
e-books may be leveling off as more consumers switch to tablets, which allow
users to access a variety of content, not just e-books. Or at least that was
the conclusion of Rough Type blogger Nicholas Carr, who has recently been
taking some heat for his analysis.
Based on sales
figures supplied by the Association of American Publishers, Carr thought he spotted
a trend: slowing growth in e-book sales, signifying that e-books are reaching a
plateau with the public. The decelerating sales appeared to coincide with the
acceleration of tablet sales. Carr speculated tablet users were pulled away
from e-books by all the other things they could do with their devices.
David Ulin,
in the Los Angeles Times’ Jacket Copy
blog, thinks Carr makes some good points about tablets and how people use them.
Ulin himself admits to being distracted by other options when he’s reading on a
tablet.
But the AAP
took issue with Carr’s interpretation of its numbers, pointing out that last
year’s e-book sales were inflated by The
Hunger Games series. This year there hasn’t been a similar phenomenon in
the book world. Minus The Hunger Games,
the year-over-year e-book growth is much higher and doesn’t seem to correlate
to tablet sales.
Blogger/author
Nathan Bransford agrees. “Everyone needs to stop fixating on YOY percentage
growth. Even at a steady rate of overall growth, percentage growth inevitably
goes down because it’s starting from a bigger base. It’s simple math,” he says,
adding that the AAP sales figures don’t count self-published e-books sold
directly.
It’s also
possible that tablet buyers are still acquiring and reading as many—or even
more—e-books as ever, but just not purchasing them outright. AAP tracks only
sales, but e-book rentals are on the upswing, too, mostly for digital
textbooks. Public and campus libraries are stocking more e-books for borrowing
and report rising interest in e-book loans.
And then
there are thousands of e-book titles available for free downloading. Some are
classics in the public domain; others are distributed by authors, speakers,
entrepreneurs, and organizations.
