Quote:
Originally Posted by Andrew H.
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Your link is simply CNET regurgitating an Amazon press release. Now, I won't say press releases aren't credible but -- well, they're not credible. Most independent estimates I've seen placed Amazon's market share at around 60%.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Andrew H.
iBooks have become basically a non-entity as a format, as people use their iPads to read Kindle and Nook books.
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iBooks isn't a format, it's an app. The iBooks format is epub.
Follow
the link at the bottom of that CNET article, and you'll find a claim that iBooks is the most popular app on the iPad, with Kindle and Nook flopping around in the 2nd and 3rd spots.
This article, and
this one, seem to confirm iBooks' popularity.
Another estimate I've seen recently (sorry, can't find it) put Amazon at 40% of iPad ebook sales and Apple at 29%. That's not necessarily inconsistent with iBooks' top ranking (if you believe that), but either way, I don't see how you can get "non-entity" out of that.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Andrew H.
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Well, 60% of 75% is 45%, which is consistent with the IDC study (the original study is
here):
"Amazon’s Kindle rules e-readers with a nearly 42% share of the market."
Quote:
Originally Posted by Andrew H.
I'm not sure yet how much the international market matters
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Two responses: first, I don't have any numbers (I'm sure the IDC study could shed light, but I'm not willing to pay for it :-); in any case, as evidenced by our discussion, it's possible to google up just about any number you want; I think Mark Twain must have been a google-user), but I strongly suspect the international ereader market is growing faster than the North American one. Chinese bought 3.5 million ereaders in 2010, which is up nearly four-fold from 2009, making for much higher year-on-year growth that the US saw. So, as with Amazon, I don't see the US' market share numbers going anywhere but down.
Further, with Sony making the switch, the second through fourth spots in the IDC study, which comprise 48%, all support epub.
Second, I'm not really sure how much the
ereader market matters. Another MR thread is currently discussing a CNET article which predicts that ereaders are a doomed technology, and CNET may be right. The explosion of the tablet market, and the migration of ereading capabilities to many multi-function devices, will certainly eat into dedicated ereader sales (iPad sales alone, according to the IDC report, are expected to be nearly triple the entire ereader market in 2011), as casual readers will have even less reason to drop money on a dedicated device. My own wife is chomping at the bit to get an iPad for reading; she finds my ereader useless. And once I move to a tablet, I may not keep my ereader around either. And I'm sure we're not the only ones. So it's not simply a matter of Amazon competing in the dedicated ereader market, but trying to establish .azw ubiquity across the entire technology industry.
I fear any discussion on epub vs azw that limits itself to the dedicated reader market may be missing the larger picture.
--Nathanael