In this blog post, we compare the development of e-books and the role of paper books, and look at the possibility of coexistence and the future of the two media.
We live in a digital age where we get a lot of information every day through PCs and smartphones. This is because digital media is widely available and there is a sufficient supply of digital content delivered through such media. People have become accustomed to getting news faster through the Internet than through newspapers, and freely enjoying various content on YouTube rather than through TV broadcasts. Although people are naturally switching from analog to digital media, it is easy to see people reading books or notes diligently on the subway during exam periods at universities. Why are they carrying heavy books instead of using their smartphones to solve everything as usual? This is probably because the medium of the book has not yet been fully converted to a digital medium. Although e-books have been around for decades, they have not yet surpassed the status of “paper books,” and they are also lacking in public recognition. This phenomenon seems to have not been popularized because some problems have not yet been solved despite the great advantages that e-books have. In this article, I will discuss how e-books have developed to reach the present, what the unresolved problems are, and where e-books will be placed after the problems are solved.
Before taking a brief look at the history of e-books, let’s first recall the history of “paper books.” If “paper books” are considered to refer to all books recorded in analog media, their history would go back to the time when paper was invented by Chae Yoon and include the time when books were recorded on silk or bamboo. E-books also appeared from the early days of the digital era. The Encyclopedia Britannica, which was available on CD-ROM, and various fantasy novels serialized through PC communication already had a form of e-books. We just didn’t call them e-books. Various devices for reading e-books have appeared several times, but the only ones that we remember are PDAs and electronic dictionaries.
The reason that the previously unnoticed ‘e-book’ suddenly gained attention was the emergence of the ‘Amazon Kindle.’ It all started with an online bookstore, and now the online retailer that dominates the US retail market, Amazon.com, has launched the Amazon Kindle, an e-book device using the e-ink method, and is actively selling e-book content to match it. By using e-ink instead of an LCD display, eye fatigue is reduced and the readability of e-books has been greatly improved. The problem of a lack of content has also begun to be solved. However, the lack of a dedicated device has been a disadvantage in terms of portability, but this has also been solved to some extent with the spread of smartphones and tablets, leading to the current situation. In line with these changes, Internet bookstores in the Korean market are selling e-books and dedicated devices, but the market is still not large.
As mentioned above, current e-books have various implementation methods and, accordingly, have various characteristics. However, many people only experience the characteristics of some methods and hastily consider them to be the shortcomings of e-books themselves, which they believe to be the reason why e-books have not been widely adopted. To dispel this misunderstanding, we will look at what implementation methods are responsible for the commonly pointed out shortcomings and how they can be resolved.
The first problem is that it is inconvenient to carry around without a dedicated device. Even if an e-book is cheaper than a paper book, the need to purchase a separate e-book device can be a barrier to entry. However, this is only a problem in the days when only dedicated devices were easy to carry around. With the widespread use of smartphones and tablet PCs, this problem has been solved simply by installing a dedicated application.
The second problem is that the nature of the display causes eye strain compared to paper books, making it vulnerable to prolonged reading. Ordinary displays continuously emit light through light-emitting elements, and the lower resolution compared to paper books causes glare and fatigue. However, the use of electronic ink can solve these problems. The electronic ink method applies an electric charge to black and white particles to change their arrangement, which makes them appear to reflect light as if they were printed on paper. This has the advantage of reducing eye fatigue by eliminating glare and only consuming power when switching screens. However, it is mainly used for e-book devices because it has the disadvantages of being difficult to express various colors and slow screen transition speed. Although e-ink cannot be used on smartphones, the display resolution continues to improve, making the text clearer and reducing eye fatigue.
The third problem is the lack of e-book content, especially the difficulty of using content in Korea. This is because the main e-book device, the Amazon Kindle, is not available in Korea, and e-book content providers usually apply DRM to restrict reading to devices that support the DRM. However, the development of dedicated e-book devices in Korea has reached a level that can replace the Kindle to some extent, and the problem is gradually being solved as the frequency of use through smartphones and tablet PCs increases. It has also become possible to convert paper books into e-books directly using a scanner, and the number of bookscan companies that provide this service professionally has increased, making it easier to solve the problem of content shortages and DRM.
The disadvantages of e-books compared to paper books are gradually being resolved through the application of different methods or the development of existing methods. However, they have not yet been resolved to a sufficient level, so their distribution is not widespread, but I believe that it will spread explosively once it reaches a certain level. This is due to the accessibility, which is the biggest advantage of e-books compared to paper books. The accessibility of e-books has an effect that is even greater than the explosive spread of paper books after the invention of letterpress printing. While the mass production of paper books made it possible for anyone to easily obtain books, it still takes time for paper books to be produced and supplied to consumers. The time is even longer when purchasing foreign books that are not in stock in Korea. However, the emergence of e-books has completely eliminated these time and space constraints. Even books that take 10 days to arrive when purchased in paperback can be downloaded in a matter of minutes when purchased as an e-book.
The advantages of e-books don’t end there. E-book devices are smaller and lighter than a typical paperback book, making them highly portable enough to store hundreds of books. If you use a smartphone or tablet, you don’t need any additional devices. This advantage is not only when you are carrying it around, but also when you are storing it. If you keep buying paper books and collecting them, you will eventually run out of space on your bookshelf, but this doesn’t happen with e-books. Even if you have a lot of e-books that take up a lot of space and you can’t fit them all on your dedicated device, you can store them on your PC. Even if you lose your e-book file, you can get it again if you have a purchase history. In addition, paper books may deteriorate or become unreadable over time depending on how they are stored, but this does not happen with e-books. Also, the provider does not need a large production facility or logistics warehouse.
Although the advantages of e-books are very significant, some problems have not yet been resolved, and explosive growth has not been achieved. However, some of these problems are being solved by technological advancements and some by market growth. When these problems are sufficiently resolved, e-books will be able to surpass the current position of paper books. However, even if e-books become popular, it cannot be concluded that paper books will disappear completely. It is not about trying to determine the emotional value of a paper book. The high accessibility of e-books will not simply replace the place of paper books, but will have the effect of further increasing the size of the book market itself, as was the case with the invention of movable type printing.
