Need more proof that ebooks are changing the way that business is done? Take a look at this stat: self published ebooks have tripled over the last 5 years. Yes, that’s right, books published digitally, often without a traditional publisher, have grown 287% since 2007. That’s a tremendous statistic.
Lest you think that this number is meaningless, because ebooks accounted for very little of the market in 2007, well, ebooks now account for 43% of all published books in 2011. And that ebooks grew by only 129% between 2006 and 2011, so most of that growth has been in the last year or so.
Also important, these statistics don’t include titles without an ISBN, like those created by Amazon’s Kindle Direct Publishing. So most of the small works created by individuals are already factored out. That means the number of digitally published books is likely much higher than the 87,201 that the Bowker (who manages ISBN’s for books) report mentions.
While many doubted it would ever come to pass, ebooks are truly here to stay. Despite a rocky start, and a long period of time where people kept claiming that ebooks would arrive shortly in which they didn’t (pretty much every year from 1988 to 2006 was declared the year of the ebook), ebooks are now a common staple of reading. And for good reason. They confer many advantages over a regular book, of which hyperlinking references and built-in dictionaries are the least.
Right now, physical books still outsell physical books, but it is a close call. And ebooks already outsell physical books on Amazon, and ebooks already outsell hardcover books. And all this is before ebook prices plummet thanks to the price fixing lawsuit that hit Apple and several others.
Whether you like it or not, Ebooks are the future, and they’re here to stay.