E-books catching on with readers

E-book sales are seeing a significant upswing, said Hugh McGuire, CEO of Book Oven, an online company that builds Web tools for publishing e-books and print-on-demand titles.

“The U.S. wholesale e-book market was about $50 million in 2008 (retail would be about double), but it’s growing exponentially,” McGuire said, citing figures from the International Digital Publishing Forum, a group that tracks the e-book market. McGuire said that in the first quarter of 2009, the wholesale market was about $25.8 million, an increase of 53 percent over the previous quarter.

McGuire concedes that e-books are only 1 to 3 percent of the overall publishing market. But the success of the Kindle, and moves by Google — who, along with Sony, is offering free titles online — indicate a bright future, he said.

“I would expect 20 percent of book sales to be digital by 2014, but some have predicted an even bigger percentage by then,” he said. “Twenty percent of the current book market is something like $5 billion.”  CNN

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