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Originally Posted by Lemurion
I've been doing a lot of thinking about the overall transition, and I'm pretty sure we're still going to be seeing paper books in quantity for at least the next two or three decades.
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One of the reasons that makes digital stuff not catch on is older people.
With "older people" I mean anybody above 45 or so; the people that did not grow up with computers from the very start of their lives. There are a lot of those people who don't want to learn how technology works; any technology for that matter.
Buying an ebook and then start reading it is difficult, compared to buying a paper book in a local bookshop, especially if you want to read the book on an e-reader it was not created for. If the book has DRM on it, then it will be more complicated still.
It's only simple if you buy the book directly from the reader. (Can you do that, buy a book directly from a Kindle, without EVER having to touch a computer, not even to set up your account and input your creditcard?)
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What I do expect to see over the next decade is that ebooks will marginalize mass-market paperbacks and take over that aspect of the industry. The mass market is so inefficient, that as ebooks become more and more popular mass market paperbacks just aren't going to make financial sense to produce. Cheap "disposable" reads are going to be almost entirely electronic within 20 years, but I expect the market for trade paperbacks and hardcovers to remain fairly strong.
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This, indeed. Cheap ebooks are perfect for the "one-off read", the books that you read once for amusement and probably will never read again. I think hard covers will become collectors editions of books that are either very important/classic, or sell extremely well.