Okay, so now we know where the e-book is going. Ever upward.
To have predicted that twelve years ago, when I had all my novels reversed from major publishers and launched all my writings in e-books and print-on-demand, was a no-brainer. People thought I was mad. No brownie points required. It was a slam-dunk. Publishers, authors, retailers, the whole kit and caboodle of the book industry were asleep at the switch.
Read more: The Coming Battle of E-Readers
Don’t believe all that hype about government interference that is designed to foster an Amazon monopoly of the ebook business. What the six major publishers were alleged to have done was collude in fixing prices that, if true, was a desperate act that they must have known would fall afoul of anti-trust laws.
The new ploy by book publishers is to characterize Amazon as a monopoly poised to take over and dictate terms and run rampant over those who create ebook content. That is like saying Starbucks is a monopoly because it currently dominates the coffee retail business.
Read more: Don’t Believe the E-Book Monopoly Ploy
After years of agony, the demise of Borders was as predictable as the sunset. It was like the horse and buggy murdered by the horseless carriage. It is sad and hurtful to many people who worked there but no crystal ball was needed. Its time had come.
The brick and mortar chain stores are probably doomed and what remains will contract and eventually succumb as more and more readers morph to screen reading on devices.
Read more: Beyond Borders
While I have often patted myself on the back for recognizing more than fifteen years ago that e-books would one day surpass the printed book as the ultimate first choice of dedicated readers everywhere, I had not reckoned on the unintended consequences of an unfiltered tsunami of self-published books that would one day overtake the traditional distribution patterns of the publishing industry.
The number of self-published e-books has surpassed and will continue to surpass, by far, books published through the time-honored process of editing and distribution that has been the practice of publishing companies for centuries.
Read more: E-Books: Unintended Consequences
In another few weeks, I will be moving to another apartment in the same building in Manhattan where I have spent the past few years. While moving in itself is a traumatic event as everyone knows, my principal problem is books.
I have a huge collection of books. In the three or four major moves in my lifetime I have culled, boxed, given away and donated thousands of books. During each nesting experience, however, I have acquired yet more books and have repeated the culling process each time. I could never pass a bookstore without buying one or more books.
Read more: My Book Problem
Now that the skeptics in the publishing industry, the media, assorted prognosticators and self-proclaimed experts have finally realized that they had it all wrong about e-books, it is time to move to the next big idea affecting readers and authors.
Matching up the serious reader with his or her natural author mate?
How does one find their reading material of choice when the filters, meaning the old army of “experts” who once dominated the book pickers round table have been lost in the fog of the Internet. Let us confine this discussion to the realm of fiction, which, for obvious reasons is my abiding concern.
Read more: The Enigma of Matchmaking Between Author and Reader
It should now be obvious to anyone who reads books on a regular basis that digitized versions of books will dominate the marketplace for dedicated readers far sooner than anyone had predicted.
Having made the entry into digital publishing of my own works of fiction ten years ago, I have never lost faith in the idea that content was king no matter how it was delivered. Admittedly, the early days were a rocky road indeed. Many visionaries who believed in this technology in those early days have fallen by the wayside.
Read more: The Dedicated Reader is Alive and Well
