According to a New York Times article titled “The Plot Twist: E-Book Sales Slip, and Print Is Far From Dead,” e-book sales fell by 10 percent in the first five months of this year.
E-book subscription services, modeled after online services like Netflix and Spotify, have struggled to convert book lovers into digital binge readers, while some have even shut down. The resilience of print has provided a resurgence for many booksellers.
According to the article, Penguin Random House has invested nearly $100 million in expanding and updating its warehouse and speeding up book distribution. However, industry analysts and publishing executives say it is too soon to declare the death of digital publishing. Here is what Cardinals on campus had to say:
Students respond to declining e-book sales
“I think e-books are harder to work with. Lots of teachers don’t like having electronics in their classes, and that’s hard too.”—Taylor Lawster, ‘17
“I just like physical books: there’s a sense of accomplishment that isn’t there with e-books.” –Amy Tedeschi, ‘17
“You want something you can hold, especially when you’re paying so much for a book” –Hailey Dykstra, ‘16
