The end of Encyclopedia Britannica's print editions

There has been a great deal of back and forth discussion of the desirability of paper books as compared to that of eBooks. Those of us who write with the intent to see our works published and distributed have good reason to pay attention to that conversation. The talk goes on between readers, between publishers, between booksellers, and, of course, between writers. Writers need to learn what the others are saying. If writers ignore all of the discussions, then writers may lose sight of the ever-changing markets for their writing.

Now there is news from the publishers of Encyclopedia Britannica. (See the last section of this article.)

I just finished publishing an article about eBooks and their evolving into electronics through many millennia of changes from pictographs on stone, through paints on animal hides, one-at-a-time paper and parchment books, paper books bound between covers, computer printouts, and, finally, to readouts using the recently developed eBook readers. From a chipped-out rock that said what it had to say with a few "words" we can now store 1,000 or more whole books of thousands of words each inside of a small electronic tablet that can be carried around in one hand or shoved into a pocket or a briefcase. The article's title is "How to get along with a smart-alec eBook. You can read it here.

One of the earlier readers of the article spoke of the bankruptcy downfall and closing of a large bookstore in her locale. She more or less lamented the fact that more closings seem to be the destiny of many, if not most, of the other big bookstores, all of which she mentioned liking and wishing they'd remain. As a final thought, the commenter said that she understood that eBooks were beginning to become popular, but that she still much preferred the "feel" of a "real" book. I have heard and have read that same sentiment voiced and in print many times. I do not quarrel with it, but I do also caution my writer friends against enjoying hauling rocks chiseled with pictograms around when they could better avail themselves and their readers of more lightweight books.

For the same reason I tell my buddies that it may be a good idea to now get serious about learning the ins and the outs of eBooks. Maybe not today, not tomorrow, not next year., but eventually, eBooks will be where it is "at." That, too, is a temporary thing. Do you want to travel with me now in your imagination and start to learn all about the "next" sort of book to evolve - the one that zaps thousands of thoughts and great concepts from its tiny electronic brain directly into your own brain? Wouldn't that be a wonder? To you and to me, yes it would. To those who will "write" for them, who will produce them, who will distribute them, and who will use them to fantastic effect, they will be commonplace.

So, now is a good time to try to discover on which rung of the 2011 book ladder you and I are currently standing. To do that, we can take a look at who is selling what today, to whom they are selling it, how much folks are paying to hold the books in their hands or in electronic readers, and even how much money is involved in all of that.

Unfortunately, some of the numbers reported and available to me right now for such a review stopped in 2004, some others in 2009, and maybe only one as of today at the end of 2011. But, even so, they paint a picture that we writers can look at and from which we can draw our own conclusions. The numbers came from an article in Wikipedia and from another article that discussed eBook sales in the United States. Plug that into one of the search engines and you will be able to see much more similar to the following.

Paper books (2004)

Number of hours adults spend reading books - 106 per year
Number of dollars adults who buy books spend buying them - $94 per year

"Trade Books" sold in the United States (novels, stories, etc.)

Total bound adult books - 861,000

Hardback bound adult books - 425,000

Paperback bound adult books - 436,000

Total bound juvenile books - 915,000

Hardback juvenile books - 280,000

Paperback juvenile books - 635,000

Total spent to purchase those trade books -$69 million

Total "revenues" for books in 2004 ("revenues" were not defined)

Print books- $22.3 million
Internet books - $1.5 million
Other books - $0.8 million

So, let's now compare those 2004 numbers to what was said in an article that described what was what in the world of the Amazon "Kindle" eBook reader, plus the electronic books that the computerized eBook reader is designed to read.

eBooks and eBook readers

Note: It is believed that Amazon eBook sales are greater than the number of paperback books sold in the United States. It was also noted that Amazon's share of the number of eBook readers shipped is about 59%.

It is claimed that Amazons sales of eBooks overtook the sales of print (paper) books for one day in 2009 - Christmas Day.

How many Kindle eBook readers have been sold as of the end of year, 2011? Some reasonable estimates (guesses) are necessary here, for Amazon is chary of spreading the actual number around. Some say 4 million and some others say 6 million. The cost of each reader varies from model to model and from place to place, but $150 each is not an unheard of price, making $900 million in Amazon's total eBook reader sales at that price a reasonable dollar amount.

As I gaze at all of those numbers, for whatever they are worth as statements of fact or possibility, they really do whisper one thing rather loudly in my ear - the total sales of all trade books sold (adult, juvenile, hardbound, and paperback) in the United States in 2004 was about $1.8 million. The total sales of Amazon Kindle eBook readers possibly sold by the end of 2011 is about $900 million.

Each eBook reader will hold at least one eBook. The lowest price eBook is about 99 cents (call it $1). If those numbers are not lying, then Amazon's eBook sales should have been at least $900 million during those 7 years from 2004 until the end of 2011. Amazon's sales of eBooks ( at only a fictitious $1 per eBook) would have amounted to an average of about $127 million each of those 7 years (not considering a start at a lower number and today being much higher). Even if only one single-dollar eBook was sold per reader per year, then eBook sales were probably double the sales for ordinary paper books even back in 2004 when eBooks were really just then getting going.

Now, I ask you, which might be the better potential market to be aimed at by serious book writers weary of their works being rejected by commercial publishers ("the trade") - $69 million for trade book sales per year or possibly ten or 1,000 times that amount for your eBooks?

Sure enough, I love the feel of a nice hardbound book in between my clutchy fingers, but I probably more enjoy the feel of lots more money and the feel of a nice glass-screen and metal eBook reader between those fingers - did I say "more?"

So, now do we writers have to become statisticians, too? Oh well, at least we will not be getting all of those rejection letters, will we? The big fact we have to recognize is that all of those thousands of eBook readers can hold hundreds or thousands of well-written and illustrated eBooks.

Guess who is going to have to write them all.

The first Encyclopedia Britannica was published in Scotland about 240 years ago. Since that time these magnificently edited and hardbound sets of books have been in continuous refinement and publication, The most recent (and final) set has now been published. Its price is reported to be about $1,350 (USD). The last printed edition sold approximately 40,000 copies, and the best year of sales had about 200,000 sets being sold to buyers around the world.

According to the publisher, 100,000,000 people utilize the online (Internet) version of the encyclopedia. It will be the only version available henceforth.