The Digital Tipping Point: Why 12% is more like 80%

Statistics can be such a misleading thing -- take the latest: 12% of the United States has eReaders.   Not very many is it -- only 12%.  Yet, something nags at my mathematical brain -- a stat I remembered hearing.  I found a lot of reference to it, but could never verify it, yet it has that ring of truth -- namely, 80% of American households didn't buy a book in the last year (could never find the original source, so it may be apocryphal, but it smacks of relevance when 30% don't know who the US declared independence from in 1776) . Now, that 80% chunk of the population is not going to buy an eReader and even assuming the other 20% buy an equal number of books, eReaders have tipped and most books are now bought in digital format. Amazon's public announcements also mirror this.

Bottom line -- the relevant stat is not what percentage own an eReader, but what percentage of book buyers buy digital books -- and I know that is much higher than 12% .  If you want to sell a book these days, you better get it in digital format.

5 Benefits of the Kindle over the Nook

I bought a Nook this weekend so I could compare it to a Kindle and so I could review the books we will be publishing in both formats.  All in all, I still prefer the Kindle.

1. Touchy Touch Screen.  My biggest beef with the Nook is the touch screen.  Oddly enough, when I was buying the Nook, the sales person at B&N tried to convince me that the Kindle had all these buttons that were easily pushed and made stuff disappear.  I've used the Kindle now for two years and haven't had a problem, ever.  The touch screen on the Nook was so touchy that I lost an entire Sudoku game, just as I was about to finish it.  My fingers were too big/clumsy to type as quickly as I can on the Kindle, plus I had to keep changing the keyboard to access numbers, which made typing in my WiFi password a monumental pain.
2. The Digital Toggle v. A Real Toggle.  The other thing the sales rep told me was it didn't have Kindle's annoying toggle switch.  Yet, I had to push about four buttons on the touch screen just to get to a touch screen toggle on the Nook.  
3. Ease of Purchase.  I guess if you are trying to conserve your book purchasing dollars, the Nook might be better for you, because it takes a bunch of clicks to find and buy a book.  I'm into click conservation and the Nook is click heavy.  Amazon is evilly brilliant in its ease of purchase.
4. Color Touch Screen.  I'm offended by the Nook's implication that I need color.  As a reader, color isn't high up on my need list.  The clarity of print is in the black and white, I'll go to the meaning of the words for color, ambiguity and depth.  I'm a reader and I have an imagination.  If I want color and computer graphics, I'll buy an iPad.  I don't need the smell of a book, I just don't need distractions on my reader.  I guess that makes me a traditionalists out of the eBookers.
5. Selection.  The selection of Amazon blows B&N away.  I know they say they have a million books, but that is only thanks to Google Books which gives everyone a million books, including the Kindle.  I ran a few quick searches and for what I was looking for I was glad I had the Amazon store.

On the plus side for the Nook, it is a functional electronic reader and a great Sudoku game (when the touch screen works).