Page 151 - Electronic Commerce

Chapter 3

Kindle products, Barnes & Noble’s Nook products, and the Kobo Glo. Electronic books are
also sold as digital content by online stores such as Apple’s iTunes and Google Play
alongside digital music and video offerings. Electronic books sold for the physical readers
(such as Kindles, Nooks, and Kobo products) can also be displayed on mobile phone and
126
tablet device apps as well as on computers using the appropriate book reader software.
Sales of electronic books grew rapidly in the first few years in which physical readers
were available; for example, Amazon.com announced in 2011 it was selling more
electronic books than paper books. However, there are some signs that electronic book
sales growth has slowed. Estimates for 2014 suggest that electronic book sales might
plateau in a few years and stabilize at about 25 percent of the total market for books.
Some industry analysts argue that electronic books serve some purposes well (frequent
recreational reading) but not others (reference books) and thus, physical books and
electronic books will likely coexist for many years to come.
An interesting example of how electronic books can be more flexible than print
editions is the Amazon.com Kindle Singles product line. In the past, short stories were a
staple of various print magazines. Many of those magazines have reduced their number of
pages or have gone out of business over the past 20 years. This reduced the number of
outlets for budding fiction writers (many of whom develop their skills by writing short
stories before moving on to full-length novels). When Amazon.com began publishing its
Singles Kindle Editions, which feature original works of between 5,000 and 30,000 words
and sell for one or two dollars, an entire new distribution channel for short fiction
appeared.

Online Music
The recording industry was slow to embrace online distribution of music because audio
files are digital products that can be easily copied once purchased. Following a period of
years during which audio files were illegally shared among thousands of users, much of
the recording industry finally stopped resisting digital sales of audio files. Starting around
2006, the major recording companies began to identify ways they could capture some of
the market for music files by selling their audio tracks online.
The largest online music stores today include Amazon MP3, Apple’s iTunes, and
Google Play. These sites sell single songs (tracks) for about a dollar each and sell albums
at various prices (most are between $5 and $12). Other companies, such as Pandora
Internet Radio, Spotify, and Rhapsody offer subscription services that stream music to your
device for a monthly fee rather than charging for specific songs or albums. To introduce
potential customers to their services, these companies offer free, advertising-supported,
limited versions of their subscriptions.
The online music market was complicated as it developed because no single store
offered all of the music that is available in digital format and because many of the stores
tried to promote their own music file formats. Artists and recording companies sometimes
only offered their music through one store and some refused to offer their music online at
all. By promoting their own file formats, stores tried to encourage music consumers to use
one store exclusively. Some online music sellers required buyers to download and install

Copyright 2015 Cengage Learning. All Rights Reserved. May not be copied, scanned, or duplicated, in whole or in part. Due to electronic rights, some third party content may be suppressed from the eBook and/or eChapter(s).
Editorial review has deemed that any suppressed content does not materially affect the overall learning experience. Cengage Learning reserves the right to remove additional content at any time if subsequent rights restrictions require it.