Quote:
Originally Posted by Billi
Without any judgement and only drawing conclusions from posts in this forum I have the impression that American buyers much more base their decisions on price and only on price than on features than European buyers do.
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You are not far off.
As I said above, the markets are different because the buyers' interests are diferent. The (non-UK) euro markets are driven by techies and hobbyists, students and academics--people who are interested in the technology and not just the stories.
Such people exist in the US too. But instead of making up 40, 50, or even 80 percent of the market, we amount to a sliver. The absolute numbers are comparable: tens of thousands, maybe hundreds of thousands. But we are swamped by the millions of ereader buyers whose interest isn't the technology or managing ebook collections or reading academic papers, but simply reading. To those people, the device is a means to an end: accessing and displaying ebooks.
Just that.
They're not interested in matters like DRM, interoperability, monopsonies or conspiracies--they are interested in romance, SF&F, mysteries, adventures, and thrillers. As long as the device lets them get to the stories unobtrusively and, yes, cheaply, they don't see much value in added features as they value simplicity.
And things don't get much simpler than scrolling through a list of titles, tapping or clicking, and start reading. Kindles even take you straight to the beginning of a new story, bypassing the cover, copyright notices, blurbs and what-not.
Which isn't to say Kindles are barebones devices; their software is actually as feature rich as any. But the features they focus on are those that assist in reading: dictionaries, glossaries, character lists, even commentary. They may be relatively week on flexibility of organizing big libraries, but they are strong in reader assistance. Things like reading time estimates, synchronization across devices, even the fact that most Kindle readers arrive pre-registered, are all features that add real value to the reading experience.
I'm a techie--wouldn't be here otherwise. My mother isn't. I've been reading ebooks since the PDA era on HPCs, PocketPCs, TabletPCs, BeBook, Pocketbook, and even Kindle. My mother's been reading just as long on a Clio HPC Pro with Mobipocket, dual Rocket Readers (she switched when one needed charging), and Kindle. Kindles are lighter, easier to read, last longer between charges and charge faster. No muss, no fuss. No need to know PCs. Turn it on and start reading. And there are thousands of readers like my mother for every one like me.
To people focused on the stories, cheap readers matter: a Kindle basic runs US$49-69--a Kobo Aura $149-169. That hundred dollar spread amounts to 20-30 ebooks right there. Maybe 50. Non-trivial. So yes, cheap matters.
The key thing is there really is one way that Amazon is negatively impacting the development of ebook readers devices: by supporting other types of devices with their reader apps. ebook access doesn't get any cheaper than free and free Kindle apps turn smartphones, tablets, laptops, and even desktops into ebook readers.
Are eink reader sales declining? Look to the growth in tablets. Look to the feature-parity of the apps with the gadgets. Amazon doesn't do small screen readers? Look to the smartphones. Big screen readers? Color? Kindle Fire. Kindle for Android, Kindle for Winphones, Kindle for iOS.
Kindle is all about the books. That *is* Amazon's business.
What makes the mature ebook markets mature is the fact that they revolve around the books, not the devices. Not about collecting, cataloguing, and managing entire libraries, but rather about the romance, the fantasy, the thrills, and the ideas in the stories.
Like it or not, Amazon (with the unwitting aid of the idiot conspirators) has created an ebook industry model that is centered on the stories, not the devices. Simplicity, ubiquity, and unobtrusiveness rule. (And yes; cheap, too.) Which isn't to say there isn't room for feature rich dedicated reading devices, just that they are and will remain niche products.