14 DAY TRIAL // This may come as a surprise, but the latest data released this month by Mobclix, the mobile-phone advertising company, reveal the fact that the number of electronic books available as apps has reached an important 27.000-book peak. The games are left behind, only 25,400 titles having been published, so far, this year.
Entertainment, education and travel follow the aforementioned components. The number of book apps seems to outnumber the games almost two to one, as the Guardian relates on its official site. So, The iPad launch next month is considered to accelerate the drift of the electronic reading even further. Dan Franklin, Canongate's digital editor, says, “The iPhone has always been perceived as a games-centric device, so the idea that books are outranking games is very exciting.”
The Guardian quotes Penguin's digital publisher, Jeremy Ettinghausen, as saying, “It's interesting to see what's selling, rather than what's being submitted – quite a lot of the books are free downloads, whereas the games tend to be paid for. I'm more interested in what's going out than what's going in.” According to Franklin, the recent taste in book apps ca be referable to the recent improvements in Apple’s approval processes regarding the fact that a large number of these books are copyright-free. The matter becomes interesting as we focus on the e-reader market, a topic addressed in a Softpedia news release two days ago. In this respect, it is important to outline the conclusions drawn by the Freescale Semiconductor representatives on the fact that the e-readers are not to be threatened by the soon-to-come iPad because they don’t share exactly the same market place. Whereas the iPad addresses the young student whose main interest is Internet browsing, gaming and media playback, the average e-reader appeals to an older person. The older customer is more likely to choose reading as a main leisure activity.
But Mobclix comes to contradict this report. The young folks are highly interested on e-books and the iPad’s famous producer is perfectly aware of this fact. Therefore, the demand still runs high on electronic books.
“For the first time in the Apple App Store history, books outnumber games, making books the biggest category in the store. The App Store has been ever-evolving since it’s conception. As both developers and iPhone owners discover new uses for apps for work, fun, and daily life we expect to see even more changes in the future.” as the official Mobclix blog explains.