Kindle most purchased device on Amazon, followed by iPod. Not good news for publisher
The Kindle has become the most purchased item given as a gift in the history of the powerful e-commerce site, Amazon.com. And, Amazon announced that “On Christmas Day, for the first time ever, customers purchased more Kindle books than physical books.” Amazon Kindle is a software and hardware platform developed by Amazon.com subsidiary Lab126 for rendering and displaying e-books and other digital media.
“We are grateful to our customers for making Kindle the most gifted item ever in our history,” Jeff Bezos, founder and CEO of Amazon.com, said in a statement. “On behalf of Amazon.com employees around the world, we wish everyone happy holidays and happy reading.”
Amazon said during the holiday rush from November 15 to December 16, the Kindle Wireless Reading Device, Apple iPod touch 8 GB; and Garmin nuvi 260W 4.3-inch GPS were the best selling electronics devices. The top selling books were “Going Rogue” by Sarah Palin, “The Lost Symbol” by Dan Brown, and “The Help” by Kathryn Stockett.
The leaders in the software category were Microsoft Office Home and Student 2007, Adobe Photoshop Elements 8; and Microsoft Office 2008 for Mac Home & Student Edition. The top wireless products were the Nokia 5800 XpressMusic Unlocked Phone, Plantronics 510 Bluetooth Headset, and RIM BlackBerry Bold 9700 Phone.
In gaming, users snapped up the Wii Fit Plus with balance board, New Super Mario Bros., and Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2.
The news about the Kindle should send a shutter through the managements at Barnes & Noble, Borders, and most book publishing companies. Amazon plans to control the channel for book content much the way Apple did with music almost ten years ago. Amazon is at the beginning of a process which will allow it to set prices for the online versions of books and, perhaps, determine the profit margins of publishers.
Amazon has demonstrated that the increase in sales of the e-reader is happening faster than most experts expected, which should drive down the sales of physical books fairly rapidly.