Transcript Electronic Books: A New Publishing Revolution Not Dead Yet Donald T. Hawkins Director, Intranet Development And Editor-in-Chief, Information Science & Technology Abstracts Information Today, Inc. +1-(215)-654-9129 [email protected].

Electronic Books:
A New Publishing Revolution
Not Dead Yet
Donald T. Hawkins
Director, Intranet Development
And
Editor-in-Chief,
Information Science & Technology Abstracts
Information Today, Inc.
+1-(215)-654-9129
[email protected]
Then…
E-book Predictions, 2000:
A “Gold Rush” Mentality
Jupiter Research
IDC
Forrester Research
1.9M users of e-books
by 2005
US e-book market will
grow from $9M in 2000
to $414M in 2004
Revenue from e-books
will grow from $838M in
2000 to $7.8B in 2005
Now…
Quotes—2002

“E-books Are Solving a Problem Consumers
Don’t Have.”
Chicago Tribune, August 9, 2001
“E-books may be the greatest work of
fiction yet.”
CBSNews.com, May 14, 2002
 “There is absolutely a future for e-books;
it’s just a question of how quickly that
future comes.”

Toronto Globe and Mail, September 18, 2002

“The e-book market is more of a distant
promise than a present reality.”
Information World Review, May 2002
Outline
 What
happened?
 Current market events
 Marketplace players
 Appropriate markets for e-books
 E-books in libraries
 Legal issues
 Conclusions
What Happened?
Too Much Focus on the Container
What Is An E-Book?
 The device?
– Standalone readers

The content?
– E-text, digitized books
– Printed books stored in digital format

Print on Demand?
No Standards
What Happened?
Too much focus on the container
instead of the content
 No standards
People still like to read from paper
Poor readability
Cumbersome content acquisition
Unsettled pricing
Questionable value added

The biggest hurdles that ebook producers
must surmount are:
 The quality of print portrayed on screens
 The reluctance of users to switch media
and read books from a screen
Electronic Books: A Major Publishing Revolution
Donald T. Hawkins
ONLINE 24(4): 14-28 (July/August 2000)
Questionable Value Added
“The fact that technology is
able to represent documents
on the screen is clearly not
sufficient justification for
converting every piece of
paper into electronic format.”
Landoni, M., et al., The Electronic Library 18(6): 407-19 (2001)
Some Current E-Book
Market Events
(Nov. 1, 2002, p. 27)
Source: Library Journal, July 15, 2002
OEB Consumer Survey Results
67% would like to read an e-book.
 62% would read an e-book from
their library.
 61% said that e-books should be
priced the same as paperbacks.
 70% said they would buy an e-book
if it could be read on any computer.

Some Current E-Book
Marketplace Players
Dedicated Readers and Software
Microsoft
 Adobe

Gemstar
 Palm
 goReader
 Franklin e-BookMan

Project Gutenberg
Began in 1971
 Free access to books for everyone

– Only public-domain material
– ASCII text
Over 6,700 books
 Staffed by volunteers
 http://promo.net/pg

netLibrary—Current Status


Now a division of OCLC following
bankruptcy
Focused on the library market
– Follows the “one copy, one user” model
– Considering permitting simultaneous users


Over 42,000 books in collection
Over 7,300 customers (3,000 academic)
Appropriate Markets
The Student Market for E-Books
Many textbooks cost >$100 and
weigh 2-3 kg.
 Textbooks are a large continuing
market.
 62% of students prefer electronic
books over print. (Versaware study)
 The goReader was designed for
students.

Enhanced
goReader
Pocket PC features
•Windows CE operating system
•IE browser
•Modem support
•OEB, HTML, and MS Office
document capability
Full color, high resolution
10.4 inch touch screen
Weighs less than 3 pounds
Holds up to 150,000 pages of text
The Student Market
Recent New Cautions




Can’t utilize during brief periods of time
Quicker to just open a book and highlight
passages
Reading experience still inferior to printed
books
Some tasks are harder to do with e-books,
and less information is retained.
(http://publish.bsu.edu/cics/ebook_final_result.asp)

Some students printed large portions of
e-books.
Source: Ariadne, Issue 29, September, 2001
Other Appropriate Niche Markets
For E-Books
Small publishers (“mid-list”)
 Travelers
 Technical books/training manuals
 Controlled environments

– Government
– Military
– Proprietary

Consumers
E-Books In Libraries
“Bringing the e-book into existence by attempting
to electrify the printed book is turning out to be
more complex than anyone had imagined… By
putting a printed book into digital form we are
unleashing an unknown quantity into the
information ecology, and it is difficult to predict
whether the consequences will ultimately be
positive or negative.”
Dennis Dillon, “E-Books: the University of Texas Experience, Part 2.” Library Hi-Tech 19(4): 350-62 (2001)
Dedicated E-Book Reader
Issues For Libraries

Titles must be purchased for a
specific device (Many libraries are using RCA’s
REB—a descendent of the Rocket E-Book)
Incompatibilities among reader
brands
 Difficult and slow downloads
 Some users unwilling to assume
responsibility for reader
 Must catalog both book and reader
 Technology problems

CDL E-Book Study
(D-Lib Magazine, July 2001, http://www.dlib.org)
All elements of a viable e-book
market are not yet in place.
 Need added functionality over
printed books (like online databases)
 E-books are not a panacea for
storage/archive problems

“The role of e-books in academic libraries is still not
clear, and there is considerable development of
standards, technologies, and pricing models needed to
make the market for e-books viable and sustainable.”
Legal Issues
Conclusions

A shakeout has occurred in the e-book
market.

Many e-book players have disappeared.

Overly optimistic predictions have been
replaced by more realistic ones.

Dedicated readers may not survive;
standards are urgently needed.

Customer concerns must be addressed.
Conclusions (continued)

Some players are still active and are
prospering.

Some new players are even entering
the market.

E-books will survive and prosper in
niche markets where they make sense.
E-books
will NOT
replace printed books!
Encouraging Signs
OCLC’s investment in netLibrary
 Major publisher investments
 Open eBook Forum industry report and
promotion of e-books
 OEB customer survey results
 Widespread downloading of Microsoft
and Adobe readers

Points to Ponder
Isn’t the Web a gigantic e-book?
 What about XML?
 Can DRM restrictions be eased?

– Will piracy losses be offset by increased
publicity?
Will giving away some free e-books
enhance sales?
 Will tablet PCs solve the small screen
problem?

“The report of my
death was an
exaggeration.”