E-Book Sales Pass Print on Amazon

While the Rapture isn’t scheduled to occur until Saturday, according to members of certain religious fringe groups, it looks like doomsday has come early for publishers of print books. Amazon announced Thursday that sales of ebooks on the site have finally surpassed combined sales of hardcovers and paperbacks. For every 100 print books sold since April 1, the company said, it sold 105 digital ones, and credited the surge in ebook sales to its new ad-supported, lower-priced Kindle. “We had high hopes that this would happen eventually, but we never imagined it would happen this quickly,” said CEO Jeff Bezos. “We’ve been selling print books for 15 years and Kindle books for less than four years.” The vice president for Kindle content, Russ Grandinetti, claimed that the digital trend is actually good for publishers. “Even though some digital sales may be substitutions from print, one of the great impacts . . is people spend more minutes a day reading. They make reading more of a habit, and that’s good for the total book business.” But Mike Shatzkin, CEO of the Idea Logical Company, which advises publishers on digital matters, isn't buying it. “[Amazon is] taking print sales away from others while their own devices are taking print sales away from them. That’s the real import of those numbers. It’s one more nail in the coffin of brick and mortar stores,” he told The New York Times. Still, publishers shouldn’t lose hope just yet, some analysts say. According to Forrester... Continue reading at 'AdWeek'

[ AdWeek | 2011-05-20 00:00:00 UTC ]
News tagged with: #mike shatzkin #mortar stores #forrester research #e-book reading #big deal #forrester analyst

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Grace Dent to Leave Twitter for Faber/Guardian Books

Publication Date: Wed, 09/03/2011 - 14:40 Faber and Guardian Books have acquired a title by columnist and author Grace Dent about social networking phenomenon Twitter. Guardian Books publisher Lisa Darnell and Faber publishing director for non-fiction Julian Loose jointly acquired world rights... Continue reading at The Bookseller

[ The Bookseller | 2011-03-09 00:00:00 UTC ]
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Book Club Associates sold to Webb Group

Written By: Lisa Campbell Publication Date: Tue, 08/03/2011 - 16:00 Online bookseller Book Club Associates (BCA) has been sold to a retail home entertainment supplier. The Webb Group, which supplies retail home entertainment products including games, DVDs, music and gifts, announced the... Continue reading at The Bookseller

[ The Bookseller | 2011-03-08 00:00:00 UTC ]
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CAMEX 2011: Moving Beyond the Book

College stores may have taken the word "book" out of their name, but they still have a lot in common with their independent bookstore brethren. At this year's 88th annual meeting of the National Association of College Stores and Campus Market Expo many concerns shared with ABA stores, such as... Continue reading at Publishers Weekly

[ Publishers Weekly | 2011-03-07 00:00:00 UTC ]
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Sainsbury's launches own-brand kids' books

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[ The Bookseller | 2011-03-07 00:00:00 UTC ]
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HarperCollins Wants Libraries to Pay (and Pay...and Pay...) for e-Books

Back in 1984, I wrote a book that sold to a lot of libraries. It stayed on the shelves for over a decade. If it had been an ebook published today by HarperCollins, there's a good chance it would have been off those shelves within a year. Or sooner. Continue reading at PC World

[ PC World | 2011-03-05 00:00:00 UTC ]
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Easons staff pass no confidence vote

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[ The Bookseller | 2011-03-04 00:00:00 UTC ]
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BBS to begin online auction of non-book stock

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[ The Bookseller | 2011-03-03 00:00:00 UTC ]
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EU Raids Digital Book Sellers in Cartel Investigation

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[ PC World | 2011-03-02 00:00:00 UTC ]
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Random House US to bring 17K books to iBookstore

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[ The Bookseller | 2011-03-02 00:00:00 UTC ]
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[ The Bookseller | 2011-03-02 00:00:00 UTC ]
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[ The Bookseller | 2011-03-01 00:00:00 UTC ]
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Media Decoder: Random House Adopts New Model for Selling E-Books

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[ The New York Times | 2011-03-01 00:00:00 UTC ]
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Random House E-book Change May Pave Way to IBookstore

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[ PC World | 2011-03-01 00:00:00 UTC ]
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Media Decoder: A Limit on Lending E-Books

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[ The New York Times | 2011-02-28 00:00:00 UTC ]
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[ Publishers Weekly | 2011-02-28 00:00:00 UTC ]
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[ The Bookseller | 2011-02-28 00:00:00 UTC ]
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[ The Bookseller | 2011-02-25 00:00:00 UTC ]
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Retailers finalise World Book Night plans

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[ The Bookseller | 2011-02-24 00:00:00 UTC ]
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[ The Bookseller | 2011-02-22 00:00:00 UTC ]
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Downward Trend in Bookstore Sales Continues

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[ Publishers Weekly | 2011-02-21 00:00:00 UTC ]
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