Ebooks Rising

Amazon has announced a milestone... ebooks are now outselling hardcover books. And not by just a little; about 50% more, and the gap is widening. This curve is following Peterson's Law of Technology Adoption: It always takes longer to actually get into the market than predicted, and if it's compelling it always gets adopted faster than predicted. (I have to work on a pithier formulation...) Ebooks are following this law (watch for electric vehicles to do the same thing).

If you're not already pursuing an ebook strategy, you must have been living under a rock for the last decade. As technology continues to evolve, your strategy has to evolve, too. New formats (like epub) demand new tools, and new devices with different aspect ratios really should be supported by different layouts. (Devising a new layout for different devices, and a workflow process for making multiple variations easy to produce, would be useful if you have a lot of books.)

Everyone with a smartphone has an ebook reader in their pocket. The iPad is selling swiftly, and there is a wave of Android tablets coming that are likely to add millions of new ebook platforms in the next year. Not to mention (as the article above does) that Kindle sales have zoomed since the price cut, and many new ebook readers have been introduced (and prices continue to drop). We'll probably see dedicated ebook readers at $99 this Christmas... and with millions of ebooks available (many of them free!), content is not an issue.

The wave is building; time to paddle faster in order to catch it!