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iPad Impact on Book Piracy

It is interesting to know the possible impact of the Apple iPad on piracy, ebooks in particular. Reports have shown average increases of 78 percent in authorized ebook downloads over the week prior to the iPad launch. Then days after the commercial launch of the iPad, six of the top ten selling business-related paperbacks was reported to have shown a significant increase in unauthorized downloads on BitTorrent. This is according to BitTorrent news blog TorrentFreak. Does this trend and set of data suggest the beginning of an ebook piracy as in the early days of P2P tech?

Such a coup may be possible, but we think that it is still long way away. And it may not even happen anymore, as consumers become wiser. Just by looking at the pre- and post-iPad unauthorized downloads of the top ten selling books on Amazon.com, you will be disappointed of not finding any data at all. It is such a difficult task, as none of them were available on public BitTorrent trackers, other P2P services, and Usenet. Why is this so? Let us go further down the next logical step for TorrentFreak to do. And this is to track unauthorized downloads of the top ten business-related paperbacks from Amazon.com. Such type of book materials fit well with the nature or demographics of iPad buyers. And of these ten, only six could be found. Compare this with the music industry in the past and if this was the case with piracy of music and movies, the record companies and movie studios would be very happy indeed. The fact is it’s relatively easy to find the current top ten songs or movies on P2P networks. These observations speak to the significantly different dynamics involved in digital piracy of music, videos and books. The lack of availability of unauthorized ebooks is really due to the complexity and the time required in accomplishing the process involved in digitizing a printed book.

In their original and traditional retail form, music and movies start off as physical/tangible media like CDs for music and DVDs/Blu-ray for movies. Burning and converting them just need inserting a disc into a drive and using software to rip the content. It is a breeze and very little effort and time are required. The end-product will normally come out as a DivX/XviD file that is about 800 MB in size or as an MP3 that is less than 10 MB. Both of these will easily fit into a flash drive today, making it even easier to handle or share with friends.

On the other hand, while books in the EPUB format – which is the eBook standard in iPad – occupy a very small file size footprint and even smaller than an MP3 in most cases, digitizing or converting a printed book is much more complex and involves much more effort and time . Not only does the book pirates need to scan a book page by page, they also need to ensure that it’s formatted in a way that’s EPUB ready. If not, the end product could end up looking like a mishmash of words with a bunch of empty pages between text. There are devices available in the market to automate this scanning process, and cuts off time, but they are very expensive for the pirates to invest in.

You are free to disagree or comment here if you have another perspective or forecast. Thanks for reading.

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iPad – Hurricane For College Bookstores

Change is the only constant in this world, and that is about to happen in many college bookstores nationwide, courtesy of the Apple iPad. If students adopt schoolbooks on the iPad, college bookstores might lose big time! It is a time of year for graduation parties and commencement speeches, but colleges and universities are already gearing for next year, even in the bookstalls. During the coming opening weekend, students will once more file into university bookstores to buy course materials, school supplies, and a college sweatshirt or two. While the university licensed paraphernalia may seem like a throw-in, it’s full-grown business for colleges and their coffers. But as the higher education industry plans for a future involving digital content delivery to devices like e readers and the Apple iPad, these college-branded impulse buys, and possibly even college bookstores, may speedily become a thing of the past.

This trend is seen in the independent online booksellers that continue to erode campus booksellers’ market share. Last year, 51% of students bought their course materials at brick-and-mortar college bookstores, and 18% purchased books online through school-approved websites. The remaining 31% either bought no materials or purchased them off-campus. That is certainly a big number to reckon. e Books, in the meantime, are slowly gaining traction with students and introducing problems for the stores. Electronic titles presently account for just 2%-3% of college bookstore sales, but by 2012 they are envisioned to reach 10%-15%. Big publishers like McGraw-Hill are keen to make content available on every potential platform. McGraw-Hill brings out physical textbooks and e-books, has its own online learning portals, has modernised apps for mobile devices like the iPhone, and is partnering with ScrollMotion to deliver content to the iPad before 2010 ends. They are letting the students drive the distribution channel in this strategy, Universities would desire to be in the heart of this effort, but students in the end, will decide. McGraw-Hill’s wide-ranging content options all come bundled with the physical book today. It is predicted that in the future these products will be sold individually.

Of course, at this point, it is unclear how content will even get into students’ mobile devices in the future. But should the iPad follow a normal adoption flight, about 60%-75% of university students will have an Apple iPad or a similar device in four years. What is the implication for the bookstores? Bookstores are preparing for a future with digital products. In July 2008 the association launched NACS Media Solutions, a device-agnostic service that works as a conduit between publishers and stores, helping to distribute content to a variety of stores and websites, on a range of devices. But should students demand content on the iPad, bookstores will be bolted out. Apple’s current App Store and iBookstore sales models give publishers the lion’s share of a 70-30 revenue split, and already cut out the schools altogether. In the meantime, in bookstores distribution model today, colleges pocket, on average, 33% of the price of a new book. What will be the most attractive sales channel to publishers will be the one that’s the most successful at getting succeeding semesters of students to use the products. It is unavoidable that college stores’ book sales revenue will decline. Stores are trying to adapt, and we like to think that they have been successful, but it is an unquestionable fact that the nature of the college bookstore will shift, huge shift indeed. As a part of that change, bookstores will be forced to diversify their businesses. Some are now stocking textbooks and collegiate gear, running a green grocer, a convenient store, and some even sells computers and the Apple iPad, every model of the iPad.

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Archive for the ‘iPad Impact’ Category

iPad Impact on Book Piracy

iPad-related Blogs

iPad – Hurricane For College Bookstores

iPad-related Blogs