Q: Kindle is to Book as ___ is to Music

Is it:

a. Record
b. iPod
c. Computer
d. Headphones 

Well, Gizmodo is reporting that Amazon’s Kindle may rake in $750m in content sales by 2010, selling potentially 2.2 million Kindle units. That’s pretty extraordinary for a device that almost reaches $500 and costs more than many of the popular mini-notebooks out right now. Bezos’ strategy should be patently clear: what Bezos wants Kindle to be, of course, is the iPod of books, and Amazon the content distributor for books, just as Apple has become a content distributor for Music.  So, yeah, the answer is B.  There’s a lot of competition in this space though and it’s difficult to see if consumers will actually transition away from the look, feel, and weightiness of a book, but also an emotional association we share with books.

In a recent blog post, Megan Savage apparently doesn’t like the Kindle because it’s, in fact, not a book. There’s no way to dog-ear the pages, she says, and there’s an attachment she has for books – a certain sense of romanticism, especially on acquiring a quality library of books. And on the point of extended value, I can’t disagree with Megan. Consumers have a relationship with books and a sense of value that exceeds the purchase price – the value is found in their acquisition and accumulation and, to some degree, their stock evidence that they were read and appreciated, and, could be read again, even passed on through generations.  Although I don’t think Megan’s observations are inaccurate or even wrong, I do think that consumer’s base needs and requirements are changing.

You see, nearly all forms of media today is electronic, storable, replicatable, editable, searchable, customizable, mashable… it’s hard to believe that consumers growing up in a digital age will be satisfied with a boring print copy of a textbook, and carry with them the same emotional baggage that Megan shares about books. They’ll want to link it, extract it, pull it into various editors, manipulate the content and cite it electronically, blog, vlog, and Tweat. Where the text is in static form, the electronic content becomes more “relevant” to the modern lifestyle and the demands upon the modern student. In thinking of the lower costs of distribution, the lesser impact on things like climate change, and the sheer direction of all media, that the Kindle and other products like it really represent a new idea in consuming literature. Searchable Shakespeare is approachable Shakespeare.  I would also suggest that the Kindle is an innovation the student’s been waiting for: students have been paying premium for printed textbooks, why not save money through electronic distribution? Besides, students have been lugging the textbook around for far too long.  

I think it’s hard to argue that there isn’t a market for this kind of service when Kindle is doing quite well. I also think it’s hard to argue that the Kindle will be a flop because of our nostalgia over the “book” and its emotional meaning/value to us. I really don’t think that Kindle will displace the library that I have in my office because books do, in fact, have an emotional value. The Kindle may, however, displace perhaps half of the publishing market, and that should raise eyebrows for anyone in the publishing/printing business, or anyone who retails books, or anyone who writes for a living, or, anyone who relies on printed media in general. You think newspapers have it bad right now? Wait until products like the Kindle make bookstores look like old vinyl record shops.

The long and short is that the Kindle, and products like it, are about to do to text what the iPod did to CD’s – and Sam Goody and Tower Records along with them. The whole concept of distributing music was flipped on its proverbial ear. I think the question should become: how will your business or profession be impacted in the same way as the music industry, or, the newspaper industry? Then prepare accordingly.

R

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