Quote:
Originally Posted by auspex
No kidding. They never even asked if the responder had ever read an e-book, let alone owned an e-reader. I'd guess that roughly 50% of real readers (people who read more than a book a month) have still not read a book on an e-reader.
With a poll structured like that, I am actually surprised that 25% prefer e-books. No doubt some publisher is going to take that as proof that the e-market is a wasted investment...
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Their problem if they do.
(shrug)
For one thing, those numbers (if you believe them) are actually showing the strength of the ebook market. What they are claiming is that 75% of the total population, prefers paper. Fine. That includes the portion of the population that doesn't *buy* books at all and the portion that only buys one book a year. Together, that makes up well over half the population.
The poll is actually telling that, of the people *buying* more than one book a year, at least a third strongly prefers ebooks and another 20% is open to the tech.
There is a difference between basing the "ebook approval rating" on the total population and basing it on likely book buyers. If you are looking to make investment grade estimates of ebook market potential, you want your numbers based on likely buyers.
Now, if you're just looking to convince yourself ebooks are a fad then including non-participants will make you feel better... for now.
Personally, I would put more stake on the reports from the BPHs that 20-25% of their sales, in dollars, comes from ebooks. Because that is people voting their wallets, not their mouth.
(And since average ebook prices are lower than print, 25% is the just lower bound of ebook market penetration.)