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D Pogue’s “State of the Art” column in today”s NYT (New Kindle Leaves Rivals Farther Back) is almost a hymn of praise to the minimizing winning features of the new avatar “Kindle3″. In comparison to its main rival, the new,neat multipurpose Apple iPad, K3′s diminished dimensions (21% less than previous models), mass (only 8.5 oz), and price ($140 [non WiFi]) win his praise and admiration. In fairness, he does list iPad competitive features, including non E Ink color imaging, touch screen control, and multiple apps. Also, he touches upon other contenders-the Sony Reader with its touch screen, and Nook’s WiFI, color capability, and [limited] “lendability”. However, in the end, the new Kindle 3 gets his nod for a coup in the e-readership consumer market.
J Bosman writes in the 12 Aug 2010 NYT that mega book chain Barnes and Noble sees the electronic writing on its walls, and is responding. Fearful that the book store may go the way of the record store, they are changing their product mix to keep up with the retail times. As previously noted (Nook Nook), they are playing up the Nook reader, highlighting it with more dedicated space in all of their retail outlets. At the same time they are cutting back on print book shelf space to sell more family friendly educational toys and games.
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The Apple iPad: ¿Death Knell for Kindle & Kith?
View Comments | Posted by bill in Uncategorized
R Stross muses in the 8 Aug 2010 NYT as to whether or not next-gen Kindles, as read-only implements, will be able to survive against the iPads of the future. She notes that iPad owners, in the first two months post launch, bought ca 2 1/2 books/machine, very competitive with Kindle’s sales of 3 books/user for roughly the same period. The Kindle remains more reader friendly than the iPad, and some consumers already own both, but the allure of the multitasking Apple may win out, consigning Kindle & its kindred to the device graveyard where dedicated word processors lay.
Several articles appeared in the NYT this week of interest to the e-reading community. To summarize:
íPrice War!
Amazon is releasing the “Kindle Wi-Fi” (you guessed it, it connects only through Wi-Fi, not a cellphone network) at the bargain price of $139. Barnes & Noble counters with its Wi-Fi Nook at $149, and Sony has the (non Wi-Fi) Reader Pocket Edition listed at $150. Apple’s multipurpose iPad remains in the >/=$499 range. The Kindle 2 is also being updated with a new improved model, lighter & smaller but with the same reading surface, for $189.
Nook-Nook
B&N will devote a larger footprint to its Nook displays, dedicating 1000 sq ft “boutiques” in @ of its stores as a try-em-out petting zoo for its Nook line. Publishers and retailers, incidentally, are hoping that e-readers will be hot gift items in the 2010 holiday season, given the very rapid fall in price point toward the magic number of $100, where electronic devices become impulse buys for many.
2(The Enriched Books are Coming!)
Shades of JR Rowling’s “Daily Prophet” in the Harry Potter movies: There are now e-books available with embedded videos, utilizing the multimedia apps of the iPad (Sorry, Kindleers can buy these at the Kindle Store, but can’t use this on the K machine itself). These books, including “Nixonland” and novels by David Baldacci and Ken Follett, are somewhat pricier than regular e-books, but do sound like fun.
The NYT (22.07.10) reports that the literary agent Andrew Wylie is opening Odyssey Editions. His company will produce, exclusively for the Amazon Kindle store, e-versions of books that were marketed before the concept of digital rights existed. (While the copyrights for print are owned by traditional publishing houses, there is an ongoing controversy over electronic rights.) Amazon will sell these books for $9.99. The first twenty titles include R. Ellison’s “Invisible Man”, V. Nabokov’s “Lolita”, and S. Rushdie’s “Midnight’s Children”
The NYT announced on July 20th that Amazon.com revealed that they now sell more e-books than hardcovers, at a ratio of about 3:2 (& rising). This has happened in the under three years that Amazon has been in the e-book business.
Amazon is aided in this by the ability of owners of other ‘readability’ devices,ie Smart Phones and Apple’s iPads, to read Kindle-sold books on these platforms, but not vice versa. Also, after the initial iPad buzz & buying frenzy, many of the reading public prefer the Kindle for reading, reserving the ‘iPod Touch-on-steroids’ for its other uses. The falling prices of e-readers as a class also contributed to this milestone in the history of the written word.
B Stone reports in today’s NYT that the E-reader market battles have just heated up by several degrees:
—Barnes & Noble lowered the price for the Nook from $259 to $199, & has introduced a new $149 model
—Amazon has countered by re-pricing the Kindle at $189, undercutting B&N
—Lesser players-IRex, Skiff, and Plastic Logis (the Que)-are either seeking bankrupcy protection or are delaying the launching of their products. Sony, too, faces the need for probable price cuts for its three models now on sale.
The recent introduction of the Apple iPad, and its general popularity (2,000,000 sold in its first two months, with 5,000,000 ebooks downloads already[!]) is the main driver of these developments, augmented by an increase in price=>some profit margins on e-book sales themselves,made by the industry’s acceptance of the “agency sales model” earlier this spring.
¿The future?: Analysts speculate that i)the market will winnow down to only two or three single purpose dedicated e-reader companies; and ii) within a year ther may be a very serviceable device priced at less than $100.
V Klnkenborg (in today’s NYT Op-Ed), an electronic reader from way back, counts the ways he still loves print books, and the potential danger of tangential distraction with e-reading. “But what I really love is their inertness.”, he states, fearing that too much dependency on electronic reading media, with all its interactivity, might wean us away from being “…quiet, thoughtful, patient, absorbed..” as serious consumers of the written word.
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D. Goleman & G. Norris have an Op-Ed piece in the Sun 4 Ap ’10 NYT re the comparative envirnmental impact of e-readers versus printed books. They consider raw material useage, manufacturing/transportation/disposal issues,& electricity use for illumination. Their conclusion?: “With respect to fossil fuels, water use and mineral consumption, the impact of one e-reader payback equals roughly 40 to 50 books. When it comes to global warming, though, it’s 100 books; with human health consequences, it’s somewhere in between.”
And, their recommendation for the ecologically virtuous—walk to your local library!
On this day before erev iPad, David Pogue penned dual/duel reviews on the front page of the NYT. His “Review for Techies” [bye-the-bye, what is BitTorrent?] begins “The Apple iPad is basically a gigantic iPod Touch”. He goes on to describe its deficits for the technologically adept, as well as for those of us who like our Kindles (1.5x weight, much more restricted title list, poor visibility in direct sunlight). His complementary, and complimentary “Review for Everyone Else” also begins with “The Apple iPad is basically a gigantic iPod Touch”, & proceeds to discuss the overall “coolness” of the device, particularly in terms of enjoying media from online sources (>150,000 ‘Killer Apps’ available!) and its long battery charge life. He does address e-reading, noting the large screen size, adjustable lighting, and other niceties.
The bottom line for the Bottom Line: Who knows? Techies and others with both a smart phone & a laptop will possibly not find anything endearing or novel; the rest of us may be seduced by the play of the interactive screen and the plethora of app possibilties.
