It’s been a big year for e-book readers – mainly due to the efforts of Amazon. Amazon debuted the Kindle 2 in February 2009, which was an improved and enhanced edition of the original Kindle which was released in November 2007.
In June of 2009, Amazon followed up with the Kindle DX, which was a large display version of the Kindle 2. It was specifically aimed at readers of magazines, newspapers and academic textbooks – and it caused quite a buzz.
The potential for academic use – from interactive textbooks to constantly updated texts, and not forgetting the opportunity for academic bodies to save a lot of money – attracted a lot of attention. As well as signing agreements with a number of colleges and universities, Amazon gained a lot of free publicity from political entities such as the New Democratic Leadership Council and even Arnold Schwarzenegger, in his role as Governor of California.
Thanks to Amazon’s foresight and determination – helped by all the free publicity – the Amazon Kindle reader has now become Amazon’s best selling product.Currently, the Kindle has an incredible 60% share of the U.S. e-book reader market and has recently released an international edition. The Kindle has now grown to be virtually synonymous with e-book readers.
It’s probably worth remembering that Amazon were, in fact, a late entrant to the e-book reader market. The original e-book reader, the Franklin eBookman, hit the market in 1999 – ten years ago. The Sony PRS reader was launched in 2007, before the launch of the Kindle 1.
Amazon might not have been first to market – but by combining effective, technical innovation and an awareness of customer needs, Amazon has achieved its current dominant position. The enormous selection of ebooks available for the Kindle on Amazon’s website and the wireless connectivity (with no monthly fee) were every bit as crucial to the Kindle’s success as were the technical aspects of the reader.
However, now that Amazon has – almost single handedly – developed the market, it seems that every man and his dog want their share. Microsoft, Sony, Apple, Barnes and Noble, iRex, Plastic Logic, Asus – the list goes on – all have their own readers ready for release or in the final stages of development.
Wireless connectivity, presently one of Amazon’s powerful selling points, will become normal and Barnes and Noble will offer users of their new Nook reader more than 1,000,000 titles to choose from. The new Sony Daily Edition reader will permit users to borrow books on loan from participating lending libraries. Meanwhile, there will probably be a standard e-book format adopted next year, which will let users lend e-books to family and friends or port them over to other readers if they want.
At the moment, many industry insiders are checking out the line up of new readers and trying to guess which one is the Kindle Killer. However, Amazon has been very astute thus far and they won’t surrender their top position without a fight. It took them under eighteen months following the release of the original Kindle to launch the much improved Kindle 2. The DX followed just a few months later. Amazon almost certainly has big plans for the further development of their e-book readers. Is it possible that the Kindle killer will actually be the Kindle 4 and that we could see this sometime in the next twelve months?
If you enjoyed this post, make sure you subscribe to my RSS feed!