Sticking to the same subject as my last post (quite a few days ago), Adam Engst writes here that Steve Jobs was incorrect to diss readers in general and the Kindle in particular. Adam goes one step further. How about an iPod reader? With all of the talk about a resurrection of an Apple Newton, perhaps that’s what Mr. Jobs has in mind already.
As to Jobs’ remarks about those 40 percent of Americans who haven’t cracked a book all year, Engst writes: “I don’t know where you got that 40 percent number, but other statistics would seem to disagree. For instance, the Book Industry Study Group, which has been tracking the U.S. publishing industry for 30 years, estimates that U.S. book sales in 2006 exceeded 3.1 billion copies, generating net revenues for U.S. publishers in excess of $35 billion. That’s a 3.2 percent increase in revenues over 2005. The book industry is growing, not shrinking. And if 40 percent of the people in the U.S. are reading one book or less per year, the other 182 million of us must be averaging over 16 books per year.”
