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As if the world needed any more proof that eBooks were here to stay, Amazon has announced that its Kindle eBooks have now become the most popular format on the site, overtaking even paperbacks.

Surely this is the tipping point

This, however, is not the first time digital books sales on Amazon have outstripped that of physical books, considering the online retailer last year announced it sold 143 Kindle books for every 100 hard cover sold. Now, though, seeing 115 Kindle books sold to each 100 paperbacks – which are comparably much cheaper than hard covers – is certainly something worth celebrating and even boasting about.

Incidentally, the gap between hardcovers and Amazon Kindle eBooks has only been increasing, with three eBooks being sold to every hardcover on Amazon.com.

You were wrong, Mr. Bezos!

One thing about the Kindle eBooks sales that has not gone to Amazon’s plans is when this physical to digital divide would be crossed. Amazon’s CEO, Jeff Bezos, predicted that this would only happen in Q2 of this year, and he’s off by a full two months. Strangely, I don’t think the man minds too much that this is so, given how big a piece of the eBook pie Amazon owns.

Riding the wave

Amazon is currently riding the eBook reader wave all the way to the bank, with the company dominating the digital reader sector in much the same way Apple’s iPad is dominating the tablet PC market.

In fact, we bring up the iPad deliberately because many said that it would eat the Amazon Kindle e-reader for breakfast. On all indications, this has not happened, with Amazon selling a rumoured 8 million Kindles prior to Christmas last year, and with the online retailer announcing the Kindle was its best selling product on Amazon. Ever.

Furthermore, though it’s easy to think other eBook readers are struggling to survive due to Amazon’s dominance, there’s equal argument that the market for digital books wouldn’t be as advanced as it is if it weren’t for Amazon. That in itself is reason enough to be quite optimistic about eBooks and the whole eBook readers market.

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It’s no secret that Apple and Amazon are squaring off in a heated battle for eBook dominance. Amazon, who had the head with its Amazon Kindle platform, continues to plough on with its strategy of selling hardware, as well as developing apps for other devices – Apple’s iPad included. Apple, with its iBooks platform for iOS devices, is looking to leverage the success of its own hardware, completing the ‘virtuous’ content-hardware circle it started with iTunes and the iPod.

The Christmas day battle

As such, when tech sites worldwide took stock of Christmas day US App store charts to see which applications were major successes, a particularly interesting sub-story was the respective placings of Apple’s own iBooks app for iPad and the Amazon Kindle app for iPad eBook apps.

Since both apps were free, and they were both from high profile companies, it was no surprise to see them both charting in the top ten. The difference was still 8 slots, though, with iBooks coming it at #1 and Amazon Kindle for iPad ranking #9.

What the chart ranking does not tell

Since Christmas is a day when many new owners of iOS devices flood the app store, it’s telling what the initial sales spikes are as an indication of mindshare.

What the respective chart ranking of iBooks and the Amazon Kindle for iPad app does not tell us is what the actual disparity in downloads was. Theoretically, the apps download numbers could differ by as little as 10 downloads, and while that is unlikely the case, it is sufficient for being ranked first and ninth.

Furthermore, isolated downloads of the eBook apps on an iPad are useless if users do not then purchase eBooks. So, again theoretically, the Amazon Kindle for iPad app could have generated twice the sales numbers of actual eBooks when compared to iBooks sales, giving the financial victory to Amazon, again.

Regardless of the tale behind the rankings, The Apple iBooks team will no doubt be pleased to win the eBook apps battle against Amazon. Granted, this is only on the Apple tablet PC, and there are Amazon Kindle apps for various platforms, yet it is telling, nevertheless.

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The world knows now that the ebooks market, and the hardware that supports the nascent reading platform, is big business. Such big business, in fact, that analysts have pegged it as a billion dollar business come the end of 2010. There is, however, a giant gaping hole in the overall volume sales of ebook readers: the Amazon Kindle platform team’s insistence on being coy about how many Kindle devices they have sold.

Millions sold

Well, this coyness isn’t due to stop any time soon, but Amazon has at least given some signal as to how successful its e-reader business is, saying it has sold ‘millions’ of Kindle devices over the first 73 days of this holiday quarter. The note issued to customers goes on to read that: ‘In fact, in the last 73 days, readers have purchased more Kindles than we sold during all of 2009. We’re grateful for and energized by the overwhelming customer response.’ Very, very, impressive.

Software still the focus

For Amazon, however, it is the proliferation of the Amazon Kindle platform that matters far more than the sale of the physical devices. With increasing competition from devices like Apple’s iPad, other e-readers, the Barnes & Noble Nook, and even smartphone reading, insofar as customers keep buying their ebooks from Amazon, then Jeff Bezos and company will be happy.

Industry-wide growth

The best part about the continued sales of the Amazon Kindle platform and hardware is the tide-rising effect it has for the rest of the ebook reader market. Competitor e-readers have become significantly better in recent months, and it is likely the quality gap between them and the Kindle will only shrink as time passes. The advantages of owning an e-reader are so varied that, at the very least, you should give them a serious look.

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The e-readers market continues to grow, and just like digital downloads eclipsed CD sales, it stands to reason that ebooks will eclipse the sale of physical books. Depending on your stance, this is a good thing. Or a very bad thing.

Reason 1: Ultra portability

Think about this – the average e-reader is exceptionally thin, and slips into any backpack, or briefcase. Now on this one thin slab of technology, you can store thousands of books, as opposed to lugging thousands of books. Sure, libraries look great, but functionality and portability help, too.

Reason 2: Instant access

The Amazon Kindle, with its Whispernet technology and its free access to the first chapter of most every book on its platform proved that people like convenience. Sitting at a conference, have you heard someone talk about a book that may interest you? Fire up your 3G-connected ebook reader, download the first chapter for free, and see if it’s worth getting the rest of the book. Within 30 seconds, you could have a new title in front of you, which is far more convenient than making a note to go past your book store later and purchase it.

Reason 3: Cheaper in the long run

If you’re prone to purchasing potential best-sellers the day they are released, then you’re likely to save money by purchasing their digital equivalent if it is released day-and-date. On average, new releases of ebooks cost less than new releases of their paper equivalents, which could lead to a significant cost saving in the long run.

Reason 4: Non destructive annotations and highlighting

Some people highlight and annotate in their physical books with reckless abandon. Others are mortified by the idea of merely scuffing the book. eBook readers cater to both these groups of people by allowing you to highlight important content, while also being able to remove the highlights at a later stage, in a non-destructive manner. A sharpie lover’s dream.

If you think long and hard about it, ebook readers have many advantages over physical books. This is not to say that they will completely eclipse and replace books, but it is to say to dismiss an ebook and the digital platform completely is irresponsible, and likely not in your best interest.

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Rumours have begun swirling that Google’s ebooks marketplace, supposedly named Google Editions, will finally launch this year in the US, with a full scale international rollout scheduled for 2011. Amazon vs. Apple vs. Google round 100 start!

Legal issues aside, let’s go!

Google executives had planned to launch this venture in the third quarter of this year already, but with intense regulatory scrutiny and legal hurdles, as well as technical hiccups, the service’s arrival has been continually delayed. Now the search giant is looking to launch its ebooks storefront this year in the US, with the rest of the world following next year, according to Scott Dougall, a product management director over at Google.

Supporting the independents

Strategically, Google’s approach to retailing ebooks is notably different from both the Kindle and iBooks approach. Whereas Amazon Kindle wants to be the de facto retail platform across multiple devices, and iBooks wants to dominate on iOS devices, Google is engaging independent booksellers in a move to position Google Editions as an open platform. And word has it several of these retailers have begun exchanging files with the search giant, indicating launch may be very close, according to publishers.

Oh, it’s on

The e-reader and ebooks space is heating up really fast, with a recent report indicating that it has become a billion dollar industry. As such the competition for retail dominance, as well as e-reader hardware dominance, has become fierce, and it’s simply too early to call a winner.

Both iBooks and Amazon Kindle have considerable head starts over Google Editions, which may make it hard for the search giant to catch up. Then again, many people thought Android would have a hard time usurping the incumbents and we all know how that’s going.

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Prior to the iPad launching, it was well documented that Apple executives were working around the clock behind the scenes to court book publishers to support what would become its iBooks platform. Back then already many said that the Apple tablet PC was the biggest threat to Amazon’s then unchallenged dominance at the top of the eReader mountain. While early on it seemed like Apple would get some share, with Amazon continuing to dominate, the market place has changed a little with Apple’s tablet gaining fast.

iPad doubles share of e-reader market

A recently released survey conducted by ChangeWave has found that the iPad has doubled its e-reader market share since August, to now be within 15 percentage points of the Amazon Kindle market share.

The US survey had 2,800 respondents, of which 32 per cent used the Apple tablet PC as their e-reader, while 47 per cent used their Amazon Kindle. This is a dramatic shift when compared to the last time ChangeWave conducted this survey back in August – back then 62 per cent of respondents said they were using their Kindle, while only 16 per cent were using the iPad as their e-reader.

Interestingly, the two companies’ collective US e-reader share was at 79 per cent during the August survey and 78 per cent in this survey, suggesting that Apple took all that market share directly from Amazon. Battle on!

This is not all bad news for Amazon

What this survey, however, is not fully able to appreciate is the number of people who are reading Amazon Kindle ebooks on their iPads by using the Kindle app. While Amazon would no doubt prefer readership on their Actual Kindle device wasn’t declining, if the platform is still proliferating on other devices, the online retailer still has a net gain, and will find itself in the enviable position of being a platform holder, and not just a manufacturer.

And, in many ways, it would be funny to see a key function Apple tablet PC somewhat beholden to another device.

What’s next?

The survey also interviewed folks who intended on purchasing an e-reader within the next three months, of which 42 per cent said they wanted the Apple tablet PC, while a mere 33 per cent indicated they’d go for the Kindle.

Nevertheless, what matters most is that between these two devices the overall ebooks and ebooks reader market will only further expand, benefiting the entire industry, as well as smaller players in the space.

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Kindle, currently the most successful consumer product in the electronic reader market, is sky rocketing in sales. Amazon.com recently announced that it will pay 70 per cent of the retail cost of books or magazines to publishers for every title that is sold at the kindle store. This 70 per cent excludes delivery costs but still will produce a massive net profit for publishers.

The digital age

More and more publications are now heading toward the online digital industry, especially now with new advancements in digital reading devices. It seems that print is quickly dying out and that digital platforms such as the Amazon Kindle are becoming the preferred medium of literary distribution. With Amazon now offering this amazing rate to publishers, it is sure to push retail and consumer demand right through the roof.

The benefits

Amazon said that Publishers will only qualify for this rate if their publications are able to run effectively on all kindle devices and applications and also in every country that the publisher has rights. The new revenue share programme is an effort generated by Amazon in the aim of boosting kindle sales as well as providing an opportunity for publishers to move into the digital realm. The director of Kindle periodicals, Peter Larsen, said to WSJ.com that ‘the new endeavour will be “a great new tool for making Kindle better and easier than ever for publishers.”’

What’s in store?

With various other digital readers appearing on the market, Kindle is sure to have some competition soon enough, but currently it seems Amazon is setting the standard. Publishers should soon be flocking to get their content sold on the Kindle store and there will more than likely be a number of print publications going out of circulation as digital reading platforms and tablet PCs become the simplest and most affordable way of reading what you want, when you want.

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We’ve chronicled the sharp rise of eBooks with awe over the last two years. From a nascent format that’s been around for some time, but wasn’t embraced wholesale until recently, the eBook has since transformed into a big deal industry. And just like the digital retail of music and of videos before it, it’s about to cross a critical threshold – the billion dollar industry club. This is a very big deal for digital books and e-readers alike.

$3 billion by 2015

Forrester Research has released a note to clients saying the expect the eBooks market to top out at $966 million (£608m) in digital books sold to customers in 2010, with that number on course to swell more than three times to $3 billion (£1.89 billion) come 2015.

Context

A $966 million industry is certainly big fry, but one needs context to understand why Forrester Research expects tripled growth in less than five years. This projection is down to how few people, within the greater reading community, actually read their content digitally. According to Forrester, only 7 per cent of adults who use the web actually read eBooks currently.

The potential

But this 7 per cent is extremely lucrative since ‘they read the most books and spend the most money on books’ – in other words, these are high value customers. Of this 7 per cent, 41 per cent of their reading is already done on digital books, with the platform used for reading being split evenly between computers and e-readers. When we start talking about people who actually have dedicated eBook readers, 66 per cent of their reading is done on digital books.

eBook readers will swell in usage, too

No doubt you’ve done mental number crunching on what all this means, but James McQuivey, the Forrester Research analyst who wrote this report, spells it out: ‘We have plenty of room to grow beyond the 7 per cent that read eBooks today and, once they get the hang of it, eBook readers quickly shift a majority of their book reading to a digital form. More eBook readers reading a greater percentage of their books in digital form means our nearly $3 billion figure in 2015 will be easy to hit, even if nothing else changes in the industry.’

In short, eBook readers are going nowhere quickly, and this very conservative estimate of where this industry is going will likely be hit far sooner than we think. What’s also worth noting is that e-reader manufacturers that are not the ubiquitous Amazon Kindle will no doubt have the opportunity to make a healthy chunk of change even if they capture a comparatively small part of the market.

Have you found your own reading habits shifting from paper-based books to digital books, or do you ascribe to the good old fashion way of digging into a book?

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The rate at which Amazon’s developers built the Kindle eco-system and got users to support the platform – device and software – is nothing short of remarkable. A product that wasn’t even available for purchase a mere three years ago has not only validated the eBooks market, but virtually redefined it. With apps already available for the iPhone, iPad, BlackBerry, Android, and Mac, Microsoft has announced that Windows Phone 7 will soon have its own Amazon Kindle app, too.

725,000 titles to Phone 7 users

A demo of the Amazon Kindle for Windows Phone 7 app was shown at the Microsoft Professional Developers Conference (PDF).
The usual Kindle app features are present here, too, with cross device sharing, bookmarking and highlighting syncing, as well as direct access to the Kindle store possible from within the app. In addition, MS users will have the fortune of accessing a well-established platform with over 725,000 titles available day one, with a nifty personalised book recommendations feature that will pop up on the home screen.

eBooks and e-readers going nowhere

What the Amazon Kindle team has managed to do, by building not only appropriate hardware but a world-class software platform, too, is guarantee that, even if e-readers do not pick up, eBooks are still proliferated by smartphones and tablet computers. Thankfully for e-readers manufacturers, the eBooks reader market has absolutely exploded, with Amazon taking a vice grip on the market, but enough share left for the smaller players to fight over.

If you’re a Windows Phone 7 user, and are keen to get your hands on the Amazon Kindle app when it launches, show your interest over on Amazon’s Phone 7 page to be notified the day it drops.

For those who still doubt the pulling power of an Amazon Kindle app, or even the viability of the eBook reader market, don’t. Digital reading, and e-readers, are here to stay.

Photo: Samsung

The new Samsung Galaxy Tab is receiving favourable reviews worldwide, and is clearly more than just a mobile phone, but rather a multi-function tablet which can do so much more than simply making calls. The Galaxy Tab is connected and lightweight, with a screen designed for reading, watching videos and even playing games.

Galaxy Tab rivals the iPad

Revealed at the IFA show in Berlin earlier in the month, Samsung has now officially released the Galaxy Tab to worldwide markets and it already looks set to compete with the iPad. An attractive phone, light but more solidly built than the previous Galaxy S, the Galaxy Tab boasts an LCD screen with a high pixel density and a good capacitive touch response.

Samsung has included different applications that are specifically designed to take advantage of the large screen size, and these include an attractive calendar application and an email application that borrows from the iPad with its dual pane view in landscape. A messaging app is included, as is the Media Hub, used for playing and storing music, and an e-reading launcher application that utilizes PressDisplay to read newspapers, Kobo for ebooks and magazines are accessed using Zinio.

The custom dialer app comes with an attractive contact browsing utility with a video call button.

Get online easily

Web-browsing is a breeze on the, as is viewing all multimedia files, while email, video calling and social networking takes special advantage of the Galaxy Tab’s optimised user interface. The front-facing camera included allows for video chat, while the rear-facing camera’s 3-megapixel capacity allows still images and videos to be captured, edited, uploaded and shared.

HD video content is supported by a wide variety of multimedia formats, including DivX, Xvid, MPEG4 and many more. Samsung’s Media Hub allows the user to view videos, while the Music Hub allows access to the user’s preferred music tunes. Music purchased using Media Hub can be stored and share the content with five different devices enabled through Music Hub. The Galaxy Tab is the latest in the line of Galaxy S of Android smartphones and delivers the high-quality performance that we have come to expect.