Is iPad contributing to Amazon record E-Book sales?

Few weeks ago Amazon reported that after less than four years of selling electronic books, it's now selling more of them than printed books.

Amazon sells 105 electronic books for every 100 printed ones.

This news did not surprise me. Not just because the analysts frequently reported the growing e-book reading Kindle devices sales.

Since I purchased my iPad a year ago I was a frequent Amazon customer buying Kindle eBooks.

I purchased my first e-book more than a year ago just a few days after I bought the iPad to have something to read on the way back to Amsterdam. As I could not purchase anything via iTunes due to a lack of a billing address in US I was forced to buy on Amazon and bought a Kindle version of eBook. It was the New York Times bestseller "Change your Brain Change your Body" by Dr. Amen

A very fascinating journey through a recent brain-body connection research.
My collection of Kindle E-books on my iPad is growing and at the moment I carry with me:
"Creativity in Product Innovation" by Jacob Goldenberg
"The Adversity Advantage" by Paul G. Stoltz
"The 4 - Hour Workweek" by Timothy Ferriss
"Full Catastrophe Living" Jon Kabat-Zinn
Today I bought the Travel Goa book as we plan to go there in November. Initially just to compare the iBook reading experience with Kindle I tried to buy the iBook version.
That try was a big failure. Unfortunately the Travel Goa book was only available in the US iTunes store and not in the Dutch one.
As long as Apple will keep confusing readers with restrictions while buying iBooks in different countries Amazon’s Kindle is - in my view - the best choice for eBooks on iPad.
My eBook reading experience was very positive.

I discovered unique features of the Kindle iPad reader as sharing my notes with my wife or highlights with the Amazon E-books readers community. I often read the Kindle free samples on my iPhone to review the book first and find it fantastic to have an opportunity to learn and start reading a new book almost immediately after I have heard about it.

I am convinced that the Kindle iPad application contributes to a large extend to Amazon great e-Books sales numbers. It is quite ironic as the iPad is a direct competitor to Kindle device. It's also ironic that due to very restrictive iTunes policy I was forced to do my first iPad purchase in the US on Amazon giving me an opportunity to learn Kindle E-books.

I still buy lots of printed books and I already know that some of them I will also purchase in E-book format. I do not think I will switch over to eBooks completely as there is nothing like a smell and touch of a new book (:
Amazon reported that the latest and the cheapest version of a Kindle device is the bestseller of the line.
However, despite of the Kindle device success, I would bet that in just a few years more Kindle eBooks will be read on iPads and Android tablets than on Kindle devices.

iPad a great future in-flight entertainment device

Flying by Martinair in the Comfort Class from Amsterdam to Cancun I received a heavy in-flight entertainment device. After watching one movie I switched over to my iPad. I had it fully loaded with my books, Financial Times and Sudoku.The iPad battery; good for a 10 hour flight and the superb screen makes the iPad an excellent in-flight entertainment device.

My recent flight to San Francisco again proved that even the KLM business class entertainment system - with a very large built-in screen in front of you- cannot compete with my iPad. The system was so over-engineered that we were even warned by stewardesses about the difficulty of finding the right spot where we could plug-in our headphones. It took me and my neighbour quite a while to find it out.

I think that there is an opportunity to change the way of designing in-flight entertainment systems. Instead of investing in costly hardware as part of the passenger seat equipment, it is better to rely on their tablets and make sure that the passenger devices can get connected to the entertainment system.

iPad applications should allow to select movies, (digital) newspapers/magazines,  food menu and pass any other flight preferences at home - long before the flight. Passengers would be offered an option of Internet connection and receive skype calls, which would mean getting rid of the unhandy phone/remote control devices.

In my view this solution offers a superb customer experience, which would allow airlines in reducing in-flight entertainment and logistics costs, and could be introduced as an option next to the already existing in-flight entertainment systems. More and more passengers will have their own iPad. According to iSuppli market research media tablet shipments will grow to more than 202 million units in 2015, up from 17.4 million in 2010.  I expect that the sales of iPads and other tablet devices will far exceed these aggressive predictions as the iPads are becoming a part of the family live style. Here I can’t resist quoting my wife "I love my iPad!".

I see no point any more in manufacturing specialized in-flight entertainment devices.  It is better to focus on iPad or Android tablets applications giving access to the  in-flight entertainment content. Manufactures of specialized in-flight entertainment equipment will never be able to keep the innovation pace with Apple and Android tablet manufactures.In-flight entertainment devices are getting expensive which is clearly illustrated by the recent Alasca Airlines announcement about the price increase of the in-flight entertainment rentals.

It is time to switch over to the tablets and start developing passengers iPad and Android tablets applications. The apps, NOT the airline websites will make a difference in the passengers flying experience in the future.