Quote:
Originally Posted by MGlitch
You can't have it both ways, either "10% is still a lot of people" or "only 13% of the world live in the US".
This has also veered WAY off topic of this thread.
|
Those are relating to different things. One is % of USA people. Americans do tend to assume what they experience is the norm. The other is % of people that might not have Internet, in or out of USA. That figure varies dramatically with country, rural or urban, demographic etc and even how you define "internet access" It might be 10% here. Does erratic 2G/3G/4G (4G coverage is tiny) Mobile (Cell) count as "Internet access"? Only sort of. Most people have no idea how to use a phone as a WiFi gateway to mobile for other gadgets. Not all phones do it. Many people I know have a tiny data allowance on their phone. A decent mobile data limit subscription costs more than Satellite Pay TV. Lots of people just buy call credit. Perhaps 70% use their smart phone via home and office broadband. That 30% not using the phone via broadband wifi is still a lot.
The UK Labour party estimates £20 Billion to give everyone fibre in the UK. There was a plan to do that, but it was killed off by the privatisation of BT.
Ireland had a National Broadband Scheme over 10 years ago. It was either €75 million or €150 million and didn't deliver a single broadband connection. They are about to sign off the new National Broadband Plan, it may cost €2 Billion for a place 1/20th of UK population and no-one knows what it's actually going to deliver.
So while MOST people can get ebooks online, shouldn't it be universal? So why not enable the LOTS of people still buying paper books to buy ebooks (somehow) instore. For any ereader app or ereader assuming it's not totally one provider only? Even Apple there are ways to load 3rd party content and all Android and Windows things can install free apps that read 3rd party content. Kindles can take non-Amazon content. No problem with the Kobo either.
It's not that far off topic, B&N is a bookshop now part of another company.
Can they and bookshops in general make money selling ebooks, online and/or instore (somehow), without a Nook?
Certainly the decision of Waterstones (now same owner) to sell Amazon Kindles really only benefited Amazon. B&N would be silly to sell the Nook customer base to someone else (like Kobo), they'd be better off offering those customers epub and Kindle format for ANY device, especially 3rd party apps on phones and tablets. Keep the ebook shop and ditch the Nook.
There is no bookshop AFAIK, in Ireland selling ebooks. Unless Dublin has something I don't know about. Certainly none in this area.
Does a bookshop need to have their own tied in ereader, or like Smashwords sell eBooks for ANY devices? Especially as most ebooks are not actually read on a dedicated eink ereader.