The Xmas eReader war hots up

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Posted by Tim Guest

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December 20th 2010 at 10:00

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Technology & Communication

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iBook displayed on Ipad

With eReaders at the top of many Christmas lists, Amazon has announced another development to their massively popular Kindle in a bid to topple the rival iPad.

The Kindle is already Amazon’s best-ever selling product, and is firmly at the top of many Christmas lists – but with Apple’s iPad iBooks seen as a growing threat, Amazon has announced that from later this year Kindle users will be able to lend each other their eBooks for 14 days.

The move by Amazon satisfies one of the main gripes of Kindle users, and gives it an advantage over Apple’s iBooks service. The normally placid Amazon has also taken direct aim at the iPad in a series of US TV adverts comparing the two products and making direct reference to the iPad’s much bigger price tag and reflective screen, which makes Apple’s tablet difficult to read in sunlight.

All this rivalry stems from the fact that the market for eReaders is growing rapidly, with an increase in sales of 150% in 2010 alone – and manufacturers are all desperate to get their slice of the, ahem, ePie.
And it’s good news for publishers as well – a recent study of 1,200 eReader owners by Marketing and Research Resources Inc. found that 40% of those surveyed said they now read more than they did with print books.

So this might not turn out to be the long-heralded death of publishing after all – more a new lease of life for the book industry. A happy Christmas all round!

Do you think eReaders will replace books – and will you be making the leap from print to screen this Christmas? Let us know below.

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