Downloads

Recently I noted a statistic that showed that 85% of Americans have not downloaded a single book in the past year. About 10% of Americans, on the other hand, have downloaded 1-10 books in the past 12 months (primarly women . . . since women buy and read 90% of published books).

Now, I'm no Luddite, but these changing stats are slowly changing the face of publishing in America.

About a month ago, I had the opportunity to change over several of my out-of-print titles to downloadable Kindle format, but I declined. I made the decision to support traditional publishing, with the publisher offering my titles in print and digital formats at the time of publication, with royalties attendant in the two versions. Still, I am amazed how many people do download my titles--though print is still far stronger. (I don't make any money in either version, but that's another story!)

Me? I don't see myself buying any of the new gadgets any time soon. I am still one of these old foggies who views the book as an object of desire, not just an information source. I see the book as an object, a piece of art, a commodity of style, a tradeable item that can be shared with someone else after I've read it, an item I can donate to a library or a need overseas. Downloads cannot play in ANY of these stadiums (lest one violate copyright laws). What would I say? I just read this great book . . . here, why don't you steal this digitalized information out of my handheld and read it for yourself? No thank you!

I'm not against downloads, it's just that I don't see the death of the hardback bestseller quite yet, nor the death-knell of the trade paperback or the mass market grocery store novel. I still read the newspaper every morning--though I can get the news from that same paper online every morning for free.

Keep on publishing Mr. Publisher. I'll keep buying!