Digital Home Thoughts: Kindle Ebook Sales Surpass Paperback

"In terms of literary milestones, this moment could be right up there with the invention of the Gutenberg Printing Press as landmark days in how we consume literary texts. Amazon has announced that it has sold more ebooks for its Kindle e-reader than it sold paperbacks in 2010. Announcing Q4 financial results, founder and CEO of Amazon, Jeff Bezos said: 'Kindle books have now overtaken paperback books as the most popular format on Amazon.com. Last July we announced that Kindle books had passed hardcovers and predicted that Kindle would surpass paperbacks in the second quarter of this year, so this milestone has come even sooner than we expected.'"

This is not unexpected news, and one that was bound to happen eventually, but I must admit it's come quicker than I thought it might. I use the Kindle app on my tablet and phone, and I do buy Kindle books, but I do miss holding a real book in my hands sometimes. I can't put my finger on what it is that makes it so much more enjoyable for me to read a real book than the ones I read on the tablet, but there is just something that does. That said, the ability to save space on storing all the books I have, keep a back up copy, and carry so many with me on my travels means that I will continue to buy ebooks for convenience, and save the purchasing of paper backs and hardbacks for those special occaisions as a treat.