Apple has only 10% of ebook market, not 22%

[HansTWN]

http://seekingalpha.com/article/2093...s?source=yahoo


But as we see, the big 5's plan to shake us down with the help of Apple seems to be working. Thank you again, Steve! And as we have been seeing that the Big 5 have given Apple preferential pricing even the 10% is a lot less impressive than it seems at first.

[Deneb]

Thanks for the link, it explains a lot. Personnally, I hadn't kept the 22% as an important figure because it didn't speak to me. The "2,5 books per Ipad" was a lot more clear for me and not so impressive either.

I don't think heavy readers, those who read a book a week or more are in those figures. What they are doing is canibalising the market of the light readers, those who actually buy harcover once in a while. In my opinion, they are missing the point with those prices.
2,5 book per ipad is not such a big deal, feels more like "lets try the thing with a book or two", is it only me?

[athlonkmf]

I'm more interested in the market GROWTH due to the iPad. I "know" (well, I've read the blogs/comments) people who were never into digital reading. Eink-readers were slow and not good for comics and their monitor is not good to read.

Now, they have an ipad and see how easy it is to read ebooks/comics/magazines on the ipad. I'd think that this marketgrowth is a number to be reckoned with.

[leebase]

That's funny -- until this article, I had never heard of Jobs has having said the iPad had 22% of the ebook market -- rather OF the publishers in the iBook store THEY were selling 22% of their ebooks on the iPad.

In two months -- that's pretty good. You have to also take into account that Jobs was only speaking of sales through the iBook store. What about Amazon, B&N, Fictionwise and everyone else? I haven't bought a single book from the iBook store...but I've read about 8 books from other sources already.

Lee

[leebase]

Just how many books did we expect to be bought in 2 months per iPad? Did the people who bought their iPad in the last week of the second month buy 2.5 books?

And the "heavy readers" -- were they not likely to already have extensive collections of kindle books, b&n books, etc?

I'm in the "book a week" class of reader and I haven't bought a single book via the iBook store. We have an iPhone and 3 iPod touches in the family and so tend to buy books from Amazon due to the ability to sync between devices.

I'm also a member of the Fictionwise.com's buywise club (may it rest in peace). I have about 40 of those books already purchased but yet to be read. I'm reading them via the Stanza app on the iPad.

Then there's also Kobo and many other book store/apps.

Until we hear from those stores how THEIR ipad sales are, we have no clue how the iPad is being used for reading.

Lee

[HarryT]

"only" having a 10% market share seems pretty good to me for such a new device.

[WendyWright]

I use the ipad. But the Kindle has far better books and greater variety, IMO. I'm waiting for a color Kindle. It might tempt me to move

[murraypaul]

Originally Posted by WendyWright

I use the ipad. But the Kindle has far better books and greater variety, IMO. I'm waiting for a color Kindle. It might tempt me to move

You can read your Kindle books on the iPad, with the Kindle app.
You can't get newspaper/magazine subscriptions though.

[HansTWN]

Can't you get newspaper subscriptions with newspaper direct? That is the best option for newspapers, anyway.

[wallcraft]

Stephen Windwalker's Seeking Alpha article clears up any questions I had about the 22% figure. When I followed Engadget's live blog of the event, the 22% certainly seemed to be of all ebook sales - although I assumed it must be for only the Agency five.

As others have said ~10% of the US market for a new ebook store is very good. This may already be comparable with the Sony Store's sales. Also, much of this is presumably from new ebook customers - since Amazon and B&N have iPad apps. So the iPad is likely accelerating ebook adoption.

[murraypaul]

Originally Posted by HansTWN

Can't you get newspaper subscriptions with newspaper direct? That is the best option for newspapers, anyway.

Another interesting looking app I'd never heard of, thanks.
This is a real weakness of the app store (and bookstore), the only real way of finding out about interesting apps is by word of mouth.

[rhadin]

Originally Posted by wallcraft

As others have said ~10% of the US market for a new ebook store is very good. This may already be comparable with the Sony Store's sales. Also, much of this is presumably from new ebook customers - since Amazon and B&N have iPad apps. So the iPad is likely accelerating ebook adoption.

The percentage is way too misleading to have any meaning. What will really indicate the Apple bookstore's success or failure is the percentage 6 months to 1 year from now. I do not think it unusual for iPad buyers (or buyers of any other new device) to buy a book or two from the vendor's bookstore to give the reading function a try. I remember when I received my Sony as a holiday gift I immediately bought a couple of books at the Sony bookstore -- largely because I didn't know any better.

But then I stopped and only recently started buying at the Sony bookstore again -- and only because I had bought the Sony bookstore gift cards at Target when Target was selling them at a 40% discount.

The key to success isn't the intial surge; it is the repeat business, which is why Amazon remains dominant.

[kjk]

Originally Posted by rhadin

The key to success isn't the intial surge; it is the repeat business, which is why Amazon remains dominant.

I don't think the percentages are relevant either-but because Amazon, Barnes and Noble, Borders, and Sony haven't released hard sales numbers either, I don't think we can draw any useful conclusions about who is dominant/growing/losing in the ebook sales market right now.

[BVLarson]

The key problems the Kindle has is the closed market (Amazon) and the limited functions (basically you read books, that's it). If it were cheap enough, that would be okay. I'm not sure Amazon can compete against something like the Ipad and all the future devices of this type built by monsters like Apple. If you can read your book on a full-functioned device that lets you do all the webstuff, watch movies, etc. How many future people will pay much for a machine that locks you in to one ebook supplier and does nothing else? Nooks and Kindles are destined to shrink percentage-wise as something like the Ipad eats up the new space.

[BVLarson]

And I say this as a Kindle owner, not a Ipad owner!