Books Are Becoming Fringe Media - GigaOM - 1 views
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Whether published in ink or pixels, books are facing tough competition from updates, posts, and a blizzard of free, brief and ephemeral writings that distract eyeballs from the task of digesting 300 pages of text.
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Book publishers may be hoping the iPad and other tablets will solve this problem, but I think such devices are only going to make things worse.
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It’s a refuge from the distractions of the web, a quiet garden walled off from the web except to download a book.
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since the advent of the web reading has increased drastically and publishers are publishing more titles than ever. Merely looking at last year’s stats is poor reporting- last year the economy was in a deep recession and people weren’t buying. However, library use was up sharply. I don’t believe there is a future for printed volumes. It makes no sense economically. However, I do believe there is a book-like format that will survive because all the media you describe do not deliver long format information, including stories, well. Books are an immersion experience, not a skimming experience.