Almost two in five Japanese don?t want to read ebooks

A recent survey from goo Research, reported on by japan.internet.com, was into electronic books and magazines, the second time this regular survey has been conducted.

Demographics

Between the 10th and 13th of January 2011 1,087 members of the goo Research online monitor group completed a private internet-based questionnaire. 52.9% of the sample were male, 16.3% in their teens, 18.2% in their twenties, 21.7% in their thirties, 16.2% in their forties, and 27.6% aged fifty or older.

The article points out that since a lot of people who don?t want to read electronic books pointed out that it was difficult to read from a screen, perhaps the awareness of electronic paper is very low.

In recent related news, Rakuten have announced that they have bought Kobo, a makers of ebook readers, and will be bringing a low-cost reader to market. Up to now they have been offering Panasonic?s catchily-named reader, the UT-PB1, as their platform, but perhaps it has not been selling too well?

My own informal research (ie, looking around on the train) tells me that commuters still prefer paper newspapers or books. I?ve seen one person once with an iPad loaded with the day?s newspaper (just a PDF scan, basically), but when it comes to mobile phones, everyone is either emailing, gaming, or reading SNSes. I?ve only once seen a Kindle.

Research results

Q1: Have you ever read an electronic book or magazine? (Sample size=1,087)

Q1SQ1: Do you want to read electronic books or magazines? (Sample size=725)

Combining the two above we get:

Q1+Q1SQ1: Do you want to read electronic books or magazines? (Sample size=1,087)

Already have	33.3%
Yes	29.5%
No	37.2% (to SQ2)

Q1SQ2: Why do you not want to read an electronic book or magazine? (Sample size=404, multiple answer)

Difficult to read from a screen	42.6%
Prefer paper books, magazines	39.4%
Sufficiently satisfied with paper books, magazines	37.4%
Price of specialised readers for electronic books, magazines is high	22.8%
Just don?t read books, magazines	18.1%
Price of electronic books, magazines is high	13.9%
No electronic books, magazines I?m interested in	9.7%
Other	2.5%

The more popular Other reasons were that it seemed either tiring or bad for the eyes.

The 362 people who have read ebooks were asked why: 60.5% said because they could obtain free books or magazines, 35.9% said it was handy for carrying around, and 29.6% that there were electronic publications they wanted to read. Down towads the end of the list, however, was just 5.8% saying that it was easier to read than paper.

Read more on: ebook,goo research

Source: http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/WhatJapanThinks/~3/jmvZfVADgvA/

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