Traditional- and e-books coexist

Introduction

This scenario focuses on a possible situation in which e-books and traditional books coexist, each with their own applications and target audiences. Because of the diversity of content in books and the diversity in people reading these books it is possible for these different ways of distribution knowledge to continue on, side by side.

Growth of e-books

E-books have a lot of practical advantages over traditional paper. The ability to quickly search through large numbers of pages and the possibility to access entire libraries of books from a device which is the same size as a regular book can be enormous advantages for people who are looking for a way to access the large amount of information books can provide. With the rise of today’s kindles this is becoming more and more user friendly, where in the past a laptop or desktop computer was needed to read e-books. This development means that more and more people who were previously deterred by the hassle of having to be behind a computer are now using the kindles to read e-books the ways they were browsing through books before.

Stable market for traditional books

Although e-books offer quick and easy browsing and searching through large amounts of books and pages, there are plenty of situations in which this does not add any additional value to the experience of reading a book. For instance when people are reading novels, they read them cover to cover, without the need for a search function.
In these cases the only advantage offered by the e-book is that it would be possible to take a large number of books with you in handheld format. Recreational readers however, only read one book at a time, so this advantage would only have some value for longer periods of time in which the reader can’t switch his or her book, and even then the difference between carrying 4 or 5 books versus 1 e-book reader is nothing compared to the libraries of information used by educational readers, or people doing research.
On top of this relatively limited advantage for the recreational users, most people find the experience of reading from paper is different from reading an e-book. Of course, not all people find this an insurmountable issue, but there is a large group of current readers that will always prefer paper to plastic for recreational use, because this is what they’ve always been used to. For upcoming generations this might be different, if they’ve been confronted with e-books from an earlier age they might not have the same sentiment with traditional books, but it will take decades for this group to have any influence on the recreational book market.

Cheaper manufacturing and mass customization of books

In order for the traditional books market to be able to compete with the e-book market there are two very important features they have to match as closely as possible. The first of which is cost, the second is the ability to print cost effectively in low volume. Both of these can be meet using new developments in print on demand. Print on demand allows publishers to cut down on stock and transportation cost, printing books near where the customers are located, and not having to keep them in stock for more than a few days. The ability of printing low volume is something that was difficult for traditional large volume presses, these have a very high startup cost which means the threshold for being cost effective was relatively much higher than for e-books. This could have given e-books a huge advantage for starting authors, but with the new print on demand technologies, traditional books can compete in this arena as well.
The developments in print on demand will start a trend changing traditional book stores. Because books can now be customized (paperback, hardcover, different languages) the printing of a book will only occur after it has been ordered. This bypasses the need for putting the books on display, and therefor also the need for traditional bookstores. Brick and mortar stores will instead be replaced by web-shops with very short delivery times that can print the book as soon as the order comes in.
Although the removal of the costs of keeping books in stock being removed is a big advantage, there is another very big advantage, mass customization. In the future, societies will be much more multi cultural, and people from a single culture will be spread across the globe. Print on demand means that Dutch people living in the United States can still buy a book in their native language, which would be a lot harder in today's situation. This also illustrates that in one region, a printer might be printing 10 English books, followed by 5 Spanish and 3 French, this mass customization will be demanded by customers of the future.

Division of the market

As described above, both paper books and e-books have situations on which people will prefer to work with them. For books being read for recreational use, the experience will be very much linear, from cover to cover, limiting the advantage of search functions an e-book may offer. Also, for primary school education and children's books traditional books offer the advantage of being more impact resistant than their high-tech counterpart.
However, there are also a lot of people that use books for work, research or education in a way that jumps from section to section, searching and browsing through entire books in mere minutes. In contrast to the linear way of reading through books, the search function offered by e-books would make an ideal contribution to the experience of this market, adding efficiency and convenience for the reader.

Progression over time

Of course, the adaption of e-books by the educational system and researchers won’t happen over night. Most likely this will start with current generation of beta studies, because they are probably less technology-averse than alpha studies which might be more traditional in their teachings. After e-books have a foot in the door of the higher educational system the usage of this new technology will progressively spread to the rest of the academic world. People that have used the e-books in their studies will start using it for their thesis research, students that stay on as PHD students or lectures will spread the new method of working among their colleagues.
After the spread or e-books in the academic world has become substantial, the rest of the educational system will start adapting as well. Many high schools take pride in preparing their students as best they can for a future academic career, so they will be quick to introduce e-books in their program. Other high school will then start to conform to the new standard, so the conversion will be complete in a matter of a few year, once the first school start using e-books.
The last step of the adaption by the educational system will happen by the later years of primary school, as soon as the first teachers that have been thought using e-books in their studies start working here, they will bring the new technology with that. Most likely the younger kids in primary school will keep working with traditional books, because of their higher resistance to damages in comparison to e-books, but as the kids progress through the early years of their educational career they will spend progressively more time using e-books to prepare them for the years to come. It’s safe to say this entire process will take at least a decade to reach the final stage of primary school students to start using e-books, but its very likely that within a couple of years from now the academic world will make wide spread use of the convenience of e-books.
Once the people that have been trained to use e-books from the start of their primary school start to reach the age where they start to become an important part of the recreational reader market, they have grown thus far accustomed to the e-book reader, they might not find the experience of reading paper worth the added cost of a real book. In fact, once the level of adaptation has become high enough,they might actually prefer to read from e-book reader as opposed to the traditional book. After all, the reason paper offers an added value in the experience of reading a book can largely be attributed to the fact that this is what they have been accustomed to their entire life. This development however is likely to take up to another decade.

Conclusion

It’s very possible for e-books and traditional books to coexist. For the next 10 years the market share of e-books will keep growing into new markets segments, and various sections of the educational systems, but after that this will very likely stabilize. The largest part of recreational readers will keep preferring traditional paper books to e-books, locking the new technology out of this market.
New technologies like print-on-demand will allow publishers to cut down on stocking cost, allowing them to lower prices of books, decreasing the price difference between e-books and traditional books so that they will still be able to compete. Of course, if the price difference becomes large enough, this will eventually outweigh the preference to paper of plastic and people would switch to e-books, so it is important for the industry to stay competitive.
Years from now, when the e-book reader becomes standard issue in the academic and educational world, social acceptance of reading this way will also grow. This means that part of the novel reading public will also start switching to e-books, if only in part, from their traditional paper books. This will very likely even out to a fifty fifty situation for e-books versus traditional books several decades from now.