Joanna Penn2013-05-19T20:03:46-04:00Joanna Pennhttp://www.huffingtonpost.co.uk/author/index.php?author=joanna-pennCopyright 2008, HuffingtonPost.com, Inc.HuffingtonPost Blogger Feed for Joanna PennGood old fashioned elbow grease.The Future of the Book: What You Need to Know as a Readertag:www.huffingtonpost.com,2011:/theblog//3.11333932011-12-15T06:55:06-05:002012-02-14T05:12:02-05:00Joanna Pennhttp://www.huffingtonpost.com/joanna-penn/Future of the Book as described at The Bookseller conference this week.
(1) You can't stop digital, but there are also increasing innovations in print.
2011 was the year when everything changed in publishing and this will be the first digital Christmas after the widespread adoption of ebook readers. It's not mainstream yet but 2012 will likely be the big year for the rise in digital book consumption in the UK. Ebooks have the strongest growth across multiple segments and are cannibalising print sales. Mass market e-fiction is growing but the children's market and academic will soon catch up with colour tablet readers like Kobo and Nook, and perhaps even Kindle Fire if it's released here.
Publishers see this trend and are changing their publishing models to adapt to the market. If you haven't tried an e-reader yet, or you're still wondering what the fuss is about, you will soon find adoption is necessary as ebook-only editions are released as publishers try new revenue models. At the same time, the print space is being improved with beautiful collector's editions and innovative presentation that make consumers want both mass-market, easy to read ebooks and special print books to have on the shelf.
(2) Publishers want to talk to you.
Publishers realise that in a digital world, marketing to the customer can be more effective than marketing to retailers which is currently essential in print. With ebooks, you can buy immediately from your device when you hear about a book and that's power in the hands of the consumer. So publishers want to talk to you directly and help you discover books, apps and experiences from their authors. The obsession at the conference was 'discoverability' with new start-ups demonstrating innovative ways for readers to find books. One stand-out example was Small Demons which links books by People, Places and Things to provide a themed browsing experience. Try it, you'll be hooked! In the next year, these experiments will result in a whole load of new ways you can interact with books and authors as well as share with other readers directly on ebook platforms, apps or online.
(3) It's about the experience, not just the book.
In the digital future, it's not just about a physical book or even a plain text ebook which is what we have now. There have already been some tentative experiments in apps and enhanced ebooks but there is clearly a desire to see more of a push into developing a customer experience and not just providing a physical read. This might take the form of web apps or apps for the smart-phone market as well as online multi-media games. JK Rowling's Pottermore was represented at the conference and is a prime example of using new forms of media to provide a consumer experience that is far beyond a physical book. Fans are already able to submit their own contributions to the Potter world and when it opens they will have their own home online. Great for the fans, but also beneficial for the Potter publishing industry.
All these developments represent opportunities and exciting new experiences for you and I as readers. The publishing world is no longer cowering in fear in the face of digital. The savvy publishers are in fact using highly creative methods to deliver quality both in the digital and print space. So don't worry about the publishing industry, because the future of the book in all its forms looks bright indeed. ]]>Why the UK is Behind America for Ebook and E-reader Adoptiontag:www.huffingtonpost.com,2011:/theblog//3.11228002011-12-04T19:00:00-05:002012-02-03T05:12:01-05:00Joanna Pennhttp://www.huffingtonpost.com/joanna-penn/
It's an exciting time in digital but as a Brit recently returned to these fair shores as well as an independent author, I have been pondering why the uptake of ebooks and e-readers is so behind America and even Australia. Here are my thoughts.
Slower release of technology.
America had the first generation Kindle in 2007 and Amazon only released it to the wider world in 2009. I was one of the first to buy one in Australia and immediately fell in love with the ease of buying and consuming books. But the uptake has been slower here as there are fewer devices across the various platforms. Even now the Kindle Fire isn't available in the UK this Christmas (although the basic Kindle is just £89). This slower tech release means inevitably we are about 18 months behind.
Pricing.
For a start, there's VAT on ebooks and not on print books. Seriously, this is one of those crazy laws that really should be changed. If you agree, please join the petition here. Then there's the fact that print books are bundled in bookstores with 3 for 2 deals and reductions so the print copies end up being cheaper than digital. If print is cheaper, you need other reasons to buy. Pricing was my primary reason for buying a Kindle when I lived in Australia as new print books were around $35 (£12), over three times the price of books in the UK, so I had stopped buying new fiction. With the adoption of the Kindle and the Amazon store, I was back on my voracious reading schedule which was good for me, the publishers and the authors. This just doesn't apply to the UK market.
It's a smaller country with more physical bookstores for new and second-hand books so people aren't desperate to find something to read.
I am always impressed by how easy it is to find a print book here. You can get books everywhere and our secondhand shops really are fantastic. In America and Australia, people may have to drive a long, long way to find a bookstore or they have to order online anyway. If you can get your ebook instantly with the Kindle why would you wait? This is demonstrated in the difference in Amazon's marketing between the US and UK. Here, it's all about space and weight as well as speed and choice whereas space just doesn't matter in those markets, it's all about availability and price there.
Resistance to change is an English character trait.
Why move to digital when there's nothing wrong with print? Here are my reasons reading on the Kindle is better than print but plenty of people disagree. Compared to the US and Australia, it feels like our national character is less entrepreneurial, clinging to the past instead of embracing the future and resistance to digital is part of that. It might also be resonant of the snobbery that still exists in publishing which is breaking down in the US as big name authors go independent and Big Six publishers move faster into digital. That change is starting to happen here but most think we're still at least 18 months behind America.
What do you think? Is the UK and European ebook market behind the US, and why? ]]>Five Reasons Reading Is Better on the Kindle Than in Printtag:www.huffingtonpost.com,2011:/theblog//3.10923952011-11-14T18:00:00-05:002012-01-14T05:12:02-05:00Joanna Pennhttp://www.huffingtonpost.com/joanna-penn/
(1) Number of books you can carry at one time
Many of us read more than one book at once. There's the un-put-downable thriller you started in bed last night, read on the Tube and want to finish in your coffee break. The business book that you heard about on TV that will boost your career. There's the cheeky chick-lit or lad-lit you are secretly enjoying and maybe the compelling biography or naughty erotica. With the Kindle you can carry up to 1400 books and other e-readers are similar. You can put them in folders and archive them but you can also revisit them whenever you like. This is also a massive benefit when you go on holiday as you can take your whole library for less than the weight of one paperback. No excess luggage fees and a happy holiday-load full of reading. (Yes, you can read in direct sunlight on a Kindle. It's e-ink, like paper, not like your iPhone!)
(2) The beauty of sampling
Sampling is one of the best features of e-readers. As soon as you hear about a book, whether it's through twitter, magazine article, blog or podcast, you can download a sample so you have it to look at later. This puts 10-15% of the book on your Kindle and you can read that for free. Like browsing in a bookstore but you can do it from your device immediately. If you like the book you can buy it with one click. If you don't like it, just delete it. One of my (not so) guilty pleasures is to roam the Kindle store for samples. I will often download 30 I like the look of and the sample will tell me whether or not I want to continue reading.
(3) Voracious readers can hide their addiction
Hands up if you own many more books than you have actually read? Or if your treat is to head to Waterstone's after work and browse the latest bestsellers? Personally I don't think books count as real spending as they enrich the mind or entertain so they must be exempt the monthly budget. However, sometimes the significant other thinks differently. With the Kindle, no-one even knows how many books you've bought.
(4) Price
Back to the addiction issue. Lots of books mean lots of cash spent. But Kindle books can be cheaper than the print version, especially if you look for the special deals and independent books. If you check the Amazon rankings, number of star ratings and reviews you will find some gems for less than the price of a coffee. There are also thousands of classics and other books for free so you can finally get through Austen, Homer or Dickens. More than enough to see you through the winter (and you don't have to go outside in the cold to the bookstore to get them).
(5) Save valuable space
Who can afford a library the size of Downton Abbey? Living space is at a premium and print books end up overflowing from bookshelves and spilling into the hallway. There are some books we want to keep forever but let's face it, some of them should make way for new reading material. With ebooks, the space issue is solved. You can still browse your cloud library from your devices but you can also live in a one bedroom flat with no issue at all.
At the end of the day, the packaging doesn't matter but the content does. If you lose yourself in a book, the vehicle it's delivered in disappears and you just experience the fictional world or the ideas it communicates.
What do you think? Are you an ebook convert or a die-hard physical book lover?
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