Kindle Review – Kindle Fire Review, Kindle 4 Review

Craig Mod has written a magnificent post – Books in the Age of the iPad. Please do read it.

Perhaps the highlight are these parts -

Let’s divide content into two broad groups.

• Content without well-defined form (Formless Content ^{(Fig. 1)})
• Content with well-defined form (Definite Content ^{(Fig. 2)})

Formless Content can be reflowed into different formats and not lose any intrinsic meaning. It’s content divorced from layout. Most novels and works of non-fiction are Formless.

 I only see one obvious ruleset:

• Formless Content goes digital.
• Definite Content gets divided between the iPad and printing.

This is a marvellous way to divide Content.

By explicitly stating that Formless Content is unaware of its container, and that most novels and works of non-fiction are Formless, Craig Mod has put forward the case for eReaders.

The only thing linking us to formless content contained in physical books is our attachment to the experience of reading the physical book.

eReaders are perfect for Formless Content

The Kindle and the current crop of eReaders are perfect for formless content -

1. The screen almost matches the comfort of print on paper.
2. The ability to change fonts and line spacing and column width makes them almost better than books. 
3. You get the speech to text function (for books where Publishers haven’t disabled it and for your own documents).
4. The battery life lasts for weeks.
5. You can read the screen in sunlight.
6. They are light – lighter than hardcovers.
7. The screen size is close to ideal - a good mix of readability and portability.
8. You can read and hold them with one hand.
9. You can search through books and search the Internet (well, on the Kindle you can).
10. You can add notes and highlights (although it’s still basic).

There are still improvements to be made – better note taking, page numbers, and so forth. However, the gap between eReaders and physical books is small enough for eReaders to be very good substitutes.

Then you throw in the advantages – 24/7 store, wireless downloads, store loads of books – and eReaders edge ahead.

75% or more of book sales are going to be eBooks in 5 to 10 years

The majority, perhaps the vast majority, of books are formless content. The nostalgia we have for physical books is easily satisfied by having a few physical books. eReaders are already beginning to edge physical books and keep improving.

With time the advantage eReaders and eBooks will have over physical books – in terms of price and convenience – will cause physical book sales to become secondary to eBook sales.

There will only be a few reasons left to choose physical books -

1. When you need definite content – content that has a form linked to the physical book. 
2. When you want to relive your fondness for physical books.
3. When you want decorations for your room or house.
4. When you want to signal what you are reading to others for status or courting.

Add those together (and whatever reasons you come up with) and you still can’t justify buying a majority of physical books.

Look at what’s happening – Publishers already see that eBooks are going to eat into physical book sales and are trying to kill eBooks.

iPad eBooks and Hardcovers will become luxury items

When you see Publishers get excited about everything they can do with the iPad or talk about the beauty of the physical book they’re basically expressing the same thing -

1. An ability to create definite content.
2. The ability to make things pretty and special and high-end.
3. The opportunity to make more money.

If you take most books they don’t need anything beyond the words. They don’t need high-end aged paper and they definitely don’t need video snippets and voice overs.

If you take most readers they don’t care about anything other than the words. They don’t care that for $10 extra they can get leather covers or that for $5 extra they can play a game based on the book’s characters.

Publishers like to paint an image of everyone reading high-end hardcovers and $20 iPad eBooks because they want to make more money. Readers aren’t buying it – they just want to read and want good value for money.

A book is built of words – everything else is external.

The battle between simplicity and profit

Plain text books on eReaders and paperbacks are enough for most people – The words are in there and there’s a simplicity and the focus is on what the author has written.

Profit dictates that Publishers drum up random reasons for charging more – that they pretend that including a leather cover or an iPad game makes the book better. It doesn’t – it creates an illusion that we are getting more value but we aren’t. There are obviously some books that need definite content and need a physical hardcover – However, not every book does. In fact, most books don’t.

The simplicity of books that are pure text and priced well is always competing with the profit motive to make books complicated and dress them up and price them ridiculously high.

We all know who’s winning out so far. We all suspect that simplicity and low prices are going to win out in the end. We just don’t know how much bloodshed there’s going to be in the interim.

Filed under: content Tagged: | content vs product, truth about content