There has been a lot of speculation recently regarding the future of e-books and whether they are going to be the next big thing. What we do know at this point is that Amazon has sold 240, 000 Kindles. Given these numbers, Techcrunch’s  Erick Schonfield suggested that Citi analyst Mark Mahaney update his most recent projections for the future of the Kindle (and to some extent e-books in general). Mahaney’s new numbers suggest that Kindle sales estimates should be around 378,000 for this year, 934,000 next year, and 4.4 million in 2010. These are not numbers to scoff at. If Mahaney’s projections are correct the Kindle will be a $1 billion for Amazon by 2010.

The big question for me is that even though these numbers are high, can e-books really win over the mass-audience. Two recent articles, one from Naomi Alderman and another from Peter Conrad of the UK’s Guardian give light to the different sides of this debate. Naomi on one hand advocates the move toward e-books. She is fed up with the piles of books overwhelming her apartment and finds the Kindle easy to use and convenient. Peter on the other hand stuggles to accept that e-books are the future. He argues that reading ebooks actually left him feeling alienated from books he used to love growing up. These two perspectives highlight the seperate camps very well and it is hard to say whether either one represents the mass public at this point.

I personally do not think that we are going to see a sudden move to e-books in the next couple of years. The cost of an e-book reader is still a large up front investment when compared to the one off price of a paperback. What I will say is that in certain segments, where people have to buy large amounts of books that they must use on a regular basis, the student market for example, we will see a fairly substantial adoption of e-book technology. Students can offset the cost of the reader by only purchasing individual chapters of textbooks as they need them, thus reducng their overall spending on textbooks for years to come. This makes perfect sense and I see the student (as they often do) leading the proliferation . The only hurdle I see holding students back is the inability to easily highlight text. Yes, you are able to click and drag, but nothing will ever replace the relaxing sensation of passing a hightlighter over a line of text.  

This is going to be a very interesting industry to watch over the next 5-10 years and if the new projections are correct, Amazon is very well positioned to ride the wave (as they usually are). See Mark Mahaney’s numbers below:

At Spreed we love the Kindle. Any technological innovation that makes electronic reading easier and more accessible is alright with us. But the product has two clear limitations that bother us. First, and foremost, is its size. We get it – Amazon is almost metaphorically replicating the traditional book here. But in this case we think holding on to a form factor that is quickly becoming anachronistic is a mistake. People no longer want “portable”, they want “pocket-size” when it comes to their mobile devices. Why should their mobile reading device be any different?

The second limitation is Amazon’s decision to use e-ink. Again, they’re trying to replicate the traditional reading experience. Less light being emitted from the page means fewer saccades (eye movements) which means a slightly more pleasant experience. But at what cost? E-ink is necessarily a picture of the page. It is not HTML or any dynamic code, and that renders the device little more than a picture window. Obviously, Spreed is all about leveraging the power of the computer to assist and improve the reading experience, so our bias here is pretty transparent. But by opting for e-ink, rather than a traditional browser, the Kindle forces itself into a corner and prevents the user from using the device in so many other ways.

Thankfully, there are others out there who are moving in the right direction. Case in point: Polymer Vision’s new Readius. Check out this article from the New York Times that describes the Readius in more detail.

The Readius is trying to offer pretty much everything that the Kindle does. Only it meets the two criteria above – it’s pocket-sized (therefore truly mobile) and is not limited by e-ink. Take a look at the picture and it’s not hard to imagine the device as a phone. Isn’t that exactly what we really want?

Congratulations to Polymer Vision for taking us one more step in the right direction.