Dear Commons Community,

Amazon.com, announced yesterday that for the last three months, sales of books for its e-reader, the Kindle, outnumbered sales of hardcover books. In that time, Amazon said, it sold 143 Kindle books for every 100 hardcover books, including hardcovers for which there is no Kindle edition.

This is part of a trend that started last year. According to the Association of American Publishers, e-book sales have quadrupled this year through May.  The Association also indicated that  the hardcover book is far from extinct in that industry-wide sales are up 22 percent this year.

I think that all of this is good news and  indicative that people are reading books.

Last weekend before leaving for a conference in San Jose, my wife, Elaine, asked me what I wanted for my upcoming birthday.  I told her a Kindle.

Tony

A full article on the above is available at:  http://www.nytimes.com/2010/07/20/technology/20kindle.html?_r=1&th&emc=th