It’s a good lesson — most things you think are incredibly geeky and square will one day turn out to be the epitome of cool. High-waisted jeans, thick-rimmed glasses, cupcakes, Dugeons & Dragons (okay, so that’s actually still dorky as hell). And now, Kindles.
That’s right, the Kindle — that awkward white rectangle, the onetime ‘pocket-protector of new technology’ is officially king. Today, Amazon is reporting that hardcover books have continuously been outsold by e-books. Just six months ago, near Christmas, a brief surge in e-book sales that beat out hardcover book sales was treated like an interesting anomaly – and the kid with the Kindle still might as well have been carrying an erector set. Now, it’s been the norm for three months and counting.
With the increasing popularity of e-readers, the release of the iPad, and Amazon’s recent decision to slash Kindle prices by almost half, it’s hardly surprising news. Plus, there’s the simple fact that a hardcover book costs about ten times as much as an e-book, (and weighs approximately a thousand times as much). Still, I can’t help but feel a little nostalgia. What are aging aunts and uncles going to buy for their college-age relatives whom they never speak to?