In an article by the WSJ, the author discusses the debate whether or not e-books will replace paper books eventually.
The Pew Research Center found that the percentage of e-book readers rose just 7% from 2012-2013, from 16% to 23%. The survey also found that 89% of people that consider themselves "regular book readers" had read at least one paper printed book in the last year. While just 30% of those reported in the survey said they had read an e-book in the previous year.
The article then discusses what the Association of American Publishers had found in its own research, that is the annual growth for e-book sales dropped to 34% in 2012, opposed to its preceding triple digit growth from 2008-2012.
Another interesting survey the article notes, conducted by Bowker Market Research, claims that it found 16% of Americans have purchased an e-book; there was also 59% who said they had "no interest" in buying one.
One theory behind why the e-book purchases may be declining in the United States is that consumers are purchasing multi-purpose tablets instead, and that people simply want an e-book to add to their reading by way of audio books; instead of full on replacing their printed books.
The last interesting thing I found in this article is from what Pew's research found to be approximately 90% of e-book readers still read printed books as well; these statistics seem to suggest that the two sources of books here offer some different purpose to the consumer.
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