Comments on: Why Apple is the stumbling block in Amazon’s ebook transition

By: Dave Nelson

Dave Nelson — Tue, 05 Feb 2013 16:02:45 +0000

In reading the comments here, Amazon fanboys seem to hate Apple and their fanboys. Folks, this is competition. It isn’t a life or death situation. Competition is good as we can see from the results so far. Amazon’s Kindle’s sales are slow. So slow they don’t publish the numbers. The iPad is dominant and does a lot more than the Kindle could ever hope to do. How does Amazon react? Simple, make a Kindle reader app for the iPad. This gives Apple’s iPad users another source for books and gives Amazon another outlet for book sales. Why all the hatred? Just because you can’t dominate every market doesn’t mean you have to vilify your competitors.

By: Ghodagadi

Ghodagadi — Sun, 03 Feb 2013 03:38:28 +0000

The fact that Amazon isn’t sharing detail is worrying. 70% of what is a key question.

By: Ted T.

Ted T. — Sat, 02 Feb 2013 13:35:48 +0000

“But I believe I can only purchase eBooks via the Apple store when I am actually on an IOS device, whereas I can shop Amazon and BN from my computer at work (despite the fact that it is a Mac).”
You can most certainly buy eBooks using iTunes on your Mac or PC. They will then automagically appear on your iPad — you just need to be logged into the same account on iTunes.

By: iansterne

iansterne — Fri, 01 Feb 2013 17:12:35 +0000

One of the largest book markets is that of text books. At least at this time Apple looks to have that covered. Look for massive sales of iPad minis to schools combined with huge book deals.

By: Edgar Allen

Edgar Allen — Fri, 01 Feb 2013 12:37:05 +0000

It is a good bet that more and more people will read books on iDevices and fewer on hardware from Amazon. Big question that remains open is where will they buy their ebooks and other digital content.

By: Ben

Ben — Fri, 01 Feb 2013 05:03:15 +0000

1) “thermonuclear” for Apple only applies to Android OS not ebooks. I think Apple dont really care about the general ebooks, they would rather be the advance platform that locks in the education sector.

2) We can probably all agree we are not comparing apples to apples here but I find Laura’s questions valid. We may even want to throw Google into this mix.

3) IMHO, who sold more ebooks on which device right now really isn’t much to brag about…tech companies are playing the long game, but publishers dont have the luxury to play the same game, hence these questions keeps coming up every few months. For publishers, they are struggling to make up for lost in print sales, if someone like Amazon keeps bragging about some magic bean growth with their platform, everyone would want a piece of it, unless you are B&N.

By: Rocwurst

Rocwurst — Thu, 31 Jan 2013 23:30:02 +0000

Apple sold more iPads in three days at the launch of the iPad mini than Amazon sold Kindle fires in the three entire months after launch.

Sounds to me like Apple is definitely eating Amazon’s eBook reader hardware market.

By: EditorEtc™ LLC

EditorEtc™ LLC — Thu, 31 Jan 2013 21:12:12 +0000

Reblogged this on EditorEtc LLC and commented: Could be more indepth but here's a start...

By: Carolyn Jewel

Carolyn Jewel — Thu, 31 Jan 2013 19:23:43 +0000

Comparing Amazon/Apple to NY Publishers is an (sorry for this) apples to oranges comparison. NY publishers do not include the self-publishing eco-system while Apple and Amazon do. Further, NY, with 2 exceptions, DRMs and geo-restricts their eBook offerings. A large portion of self-publishers do not do this. And this means the Ebook markets for Amazon, apple, Kobo, B&N etc are larger than the eBook market of NY pubs.

Another important question is, how much of the growth Amazon and Apple are seeing is attributable to books that are not NY-sourced? It’s quite likely, I think, that a portion of the reported growth is from books that do not come from NY sources.

In other words, NY could well be seeing stagnant eBook growth because of anti-reader policies like DRM and geo-restrictions. (and I realize NY is hampered by some legal issue with territorial rights) while Amazon and Apple are seeing growth because of the pool of books selling that do not suffer from those restrictions.

By: Laura Hazard Owen

Laura Hazard Owen — Thu, 31 Jan 2013 16:26:06 +0000

To be clear, I don’t deny in this piece that Amazon is dominating the ebook market right now. That is totally true. The question I am asking here is what this market looks like *going forward*. Clearly Amazon is making a major push to promote how well its indie authors are doing, and some of them are doing well, but as that market grows it is going to be harder and harder to stand out and success may not look the same as it once did.

It’s not about “believing what you want to believe” — that’s not my job. It is my job to talk about what Amazon isn’t saying, and to explore how this market could look different as the ebook transition continues and spreads to non-text-based books.