Royal Rother Rev Algenon Stickleback H Royal Rother
But anyway, I LOVE my paperbacks and cannot throw them out even though I only ever read them once (which is daft really). I just accept the fact that books will soon be a thing of the past. Or at least become as rare as vinyl records. They'll have a place but most people won't buy them.
I'm not convinced books will die out.
The thing is we are not talking about 5 years down the road here. I appreciate that some people's imagination won't run beyond that timescale (not pointing a finger at you there) but do you honestly believe that in say 100 years' time (if the HR is still around of course) people will be reading paperbacks?
It's hard to say as we don't know what technology will be around then.
If there's something that provides a better experience than a book, then it'll replace the book.
Bank statements, letters, tax returns, newspapers and magazines, diaries, schoolwork - only 10 years ago all those were (almost) exclusively printed / distributed on paper but there is a very steady drift away from that.
bank statement/forms etc aren't something that you sit down and read for pleasure.
Compared to letters, emails are just far more immediate, quicker to compose (and change if need be) and you can add attachments. Above all, email is free.
Newspapers are suffering because people no longer need papers to read the news. Few people read anything like as much online at a paper's site as they would if they bought the paper. People will sit and read a paper for an hour. Online, perhaps 5-10 minutes. And again, online sites are free. The Times apparently lost 90% of its readers when it decided to charge (but made more money out of the venture).
It won't be online versions of magazines that'll hit magazine sales, as given the choice between paying £3 to read something online, or paying £3 for an actual magazine, most would still plump for the magazine.
What'll hit them will be what magazine become once magazines realise that online they are no longer limited to a printed page. It's kind of like how early tv shows just replicated a theatre set until people realised how you could do things differently with tv, online magazine will improve as they become geared for online production, rather than just being PDF versions of printed magazines.
