Bookstore Books Don’t Always Make Hot Selling E-books
I write e-books for a living.
It’s my bread and butter. Right now I’m on a lovely summer holiday… in a country other than my own… courtesy of the ,613 just one of my e-books generated in a span of three months.
But let the truth be known – I despise reading the darn things on the computer. Okay perhaps I’m getting ahead of myself. I don’t like reading ‘certain’ e-books on the computer.
And once I give you my readers perspective, you’ll see why most bookstore books turned e-books flop in their digital format.
Okay, a couple of years ago I bought my first Palm Pilot. Neato little device. And the biggest selling point – for me at least – was that I could load it up with all the e-books
I wanted.
Then, I rationalized, I could read them all on the airplane, or at night when I was lying in bed, or in line at the Department of Motor Vehicles. You catch my drift.
A funny thing happened though.
I jumped onto the Palm web site, and downloaded an e-book that I’d been wanting to read. What joy to discover that: #1) I would save a couple of dollars by not purchasing the print copy. And #2) I could satiate my ‘immediate gratification’ bug and begin reading it right away.
So that night I started reading the e-book on my Palm Pilot. I think I got to page 11 before I stopped. And then I never went back.
Now jump ahead to early 2006 when I purchased my second Palm Pilot.
Once again I returned to the Palm e-bookstore watering hole. I picked up not one, but three new titles.
“Newer, better Palm Pilot!” I rationalized. “I’ll REALLY read those e-books now.”
It’s now August 2006, and I’ve used my