Tuesday, July 20, 2010

The Death of the Book?

Yesterday was significant in the history of literature and publishing as Amazon sells more Kindle e-books than hardbacks. While it is hopefully not the death of literacy, it is certainly changing and at a rapid rate. This is not insignificant for Christians and the mission of Christ:

It is amazing, when you stop and think about it, that God has ordained, first, to reveal himself in history, in the great acts of the Old Testament, and then in his Son—"In these last days he has spoken to us by a Son." And then to ordain that there be prophets and apostles who would put it in a book, and this then, because it's their word, would become the foundation on which we build churches and we build life. That's amazing!

It has unbelievable implications.

Everywhere the Christian church has spread in the history of the world, it takes with it schools. Why? Mainly because you have to learn how to read, not to succeed in life, but to know this book.



Update: Do not panic, yet... What Amazon Didn't Say about E-Books.
The long and short of it is there are many ways to present numbers. Yes, the odds seem stacked against hardcovers these days (disclaimer: I have one out now and it's a lot easier to sell a $3.99 e-book than a $16.47 hardcover). And while the The New York Times and the American Publishers Association say that industrywide sales of hardcovers are up 22 percent this year that seems hard to believe, especially since e-book sales have allegedly quadrupled since last year.

But just remember who's trying to control the narrative here. Amazon has an agenda. It wants to sell e-books. And lots of them.

No comments:

Post a Comment