eBooks vs Print Books

Amazon's Kindle

I’ve pretty much been quiet on the debate raging about digital books vs traditional print books, but alas I feel compelled to share my current thoughts on this newer form of media.

First of all – I think ebooks are far more than just some passing fad. More people are getting their news online from websites and blogs today than magazines and newspapers. Millions of songs are downloaded every day. And following allong with this trend, sales of digital books are constantly growing. I believe that ebooks are here to stay. 

Here’s some of the benefits of electronic books, the way I see it:

1. eBooks get published faster, potentially providing content around the world faster and more easily
2. Less bookshelves needed – save space at home
3. Digitally organize and search through books and content
4. Less risk of having a book completely lost due to damage
5. Save the backs of students who tote around multiple 600+ page books at once!
6. Potential for easy direct marketing/advertising
7. More trees saved
8. Electronic bookmarking and highlighting
9. Get content fast and easy, even books that are “out of print”
10. Make moving easier due to having less physical books to pack!

And what about traditional books? Will printed books ever completely go away? My guess would be yes, it’s a very high possibility, although I think it would be quite some time before we’d actually see such a prediction come true because the current digital reading devices available do have some flaws. Also, some readers appear quite resistant to the digital shift.  I’ve heard some say that they would never buy an eBook, because they a) prefer the “feel of holding a book and turning pages” or b) prefer the “smell” of a book, or c) really like the idea of having tangible, tactile books in their hands and/or on their shelves.

But I believe all of these reasons are only sentimental and aren’t durable. When it comes down to it, isn’t what people truly want out of books is an immersive story-telling experience (fiction) or information (non-fiction)? I do believe that with a little bit of improvment, even the most technologically-adverse book lovers may find that the benefits of ebooks will outweight those cons. Here are some improvements I think digital reading devices could use to make them more appealing to the greater masses (in no particular order):

1. Get rid of proprietary formats. Any book should be able to be read on any reader.
2. Super duper mega-long battery life, please! 
3. Color screens – let’s see those digital book covers in color!
4. Make every print book available as an ebook.
5. Come up with ways to make it easier for the sharing/borrowing/sampling of ebooks with friends.  For example, consider charging a very small sharing fee (instead of implementing DRM) for each time the book is “shared”.
6. Lower costs. Either make the eReaders much cheaper, or make the ebooks actually less expensive than printed books so that consumers can at least recoup the high cost of the device after a number of book purchases.
7. Make it easy for buyers to access ebooks they’ve purchased if they ever need to re-download it, get the ebook in a different format, etc, with no time restrictions.
8. Make it fun to carry around. Have some snazzy colors and designs available, maybe. Make people WANT to have one.
9. Provide a subscription service for ebook consumers, along the lines of iTunes and Rhapsody for music.
10. Take advantage of the technology. You’ve got a digital book – make it more than just text on a device. How about some optional theme music, an animated or book “cover”, a video prologue by the author, etc. You get the idea. And don’t forget about the potential for smart personalized marketing.

I think I plan to aim to have my shorter fiction published in digital format, and all of my novel-length fiction available as both tree-books (printed) and ebooks. But I’d like to know, what do you think? Have/would you ever give an ebook a shot?  How about an electronic short story? Let me know!

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