More on Digital Reading

According to a Los Angeles Times article, U.S. readers continue to turn to digital media, abandoning paper at a rate of 10.6% between April - September this year, compared to the same period 2008.

Four of the nation's five biggest dailies (including NY Times, LA Times, and USA Today) reported declines in circulation, as readers, ironically, flock to the free websites provided by these same publishers; again begging the question, how long it will actually be before "free" is forever yanked in favor of "subscribed."

It is noted in this article, however, the smaller papers fare better, primarily riding a demand for local news that is not as readily available online as are the news covered by the much larger city/national papers.

eBooks vs. Paper

Interestingly, though not very surprisingly, the same trend is apparent in the world of the paper book vs. its digital (and hipper) cousin. A New Your Times article reported that regular book sales are down this year, despite recent releases of prominent authors like Dan Brown.

eBooks provider amazon.com, however, reports that owners of the amazon Kindle purchase eBooks at three times the rate of their previous paper books purchases.

Sony, another provider of eBook titles, brings the further news that their customers, on average, download eight books a month to their Sony Readers, which is more than the 6.7 paper books that the average traditional reader purchased for the entire years of 2008.

And adding more fuel to the digital fire, Barnes & Noble just announced the introduction of Nook, their new eReader, which is already receiving great reviews as more than a match for Kindle.

As an aside, amazon.com recently announced that they will release free Kindle software to allow readers to purchase and read eBooks from their Kindle libarary on their computers instead of a Kindle device. This, in one fell swoop, increases the potential readership of Kindle eBooks from some half a million to near enough one half billion. Not a bad move.

Ah, yes, the digital writing is definitely on the wall.