Quote:
Originally Posted by fjtorres
Month-to-month declined, too. And prices don't vary much month-to-month.
Worth considering: eink readers are starting to show marked seasonality (in fact, sales profiles are starting to look like gaming consoles) with huge spikes in the XMAS holiday season followed by a drop early in the year. So, by itself, a december/january dip isn't much to worry about.
But the context, the current environment where NOOK STR's had a "shortfall", despite 50%-off sales, and are now being given away with subscriptions; where the uber-hot Kindle FIRE did *not* sell out and is already showing up as a refurb; where Hachette ebook revenue gowth has leveled off at 20-22% and no longer offsets their other losses...
A scenario is starting to take shape where the bulk of the people who can justify current-tech dedicated reader gadgets in the US have them (19% of the US population, according to a recent survey; with tablets also at 19%) and what remains is the casual reader (2-3 book a year buyers) market. US growth will continue, but slower than recent years and the seasonality will be more pronounced.
In this scenario, overall market growth rate will hinge on whether or not non-US markets evolve and ebooks get mainstreamed there or not. If the reader vendors don't find new markets to provide added growth, things will get very tight until new tech comes along to entice other reader classes.
The gold-rush days of fast, easy growth may be over.
Now we get to see what a mature (narrative text) ebook business looks like.
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Not simply that, but you start getting in to the new device release to drive sales. Which depending on your point of view can be good or bad. If the market is fairly saturated, what you have to do is attempt to drive owners of existing devices in to buying new devices.
That is, at least if you are making an actual profit on hardware. If you are taking a loss, or taking a loss downstream (IE warranty servicing/replacement costs) then it doesn't make sense to push new models with new and improved features much...unless of course you are attempting to drive competition with other ereader sellers to get owners to buy books from you.
I am hoping B&N and Kobo are viable enough financially to start competing against Amazon in improving ereaders. I like my nook ST a lot, but I can still see ways it could improve (higher resolution display, more contrast, faster screen refreshes, lower ghosting, more shades of grey, more storage space, maybe color at some point, some kind of built in front illumination (that has NO negatives).