3 Reasons Why Generation Y Won’t Kill The Book Industry

The #1 habit successful people share with me is this: They read books to learn.
– Seth Godin

Like many people, books and I didn’t get along too well in school. Books were essentially assignments and that meant deadlines, responsibilities, and ultimately judgement. When I performed poorly on reports I came to the conclusion that my teachers didn’t understand my style of writing. The unimpressive grades rolled in and instead of blaming my abilities I blamed the defenseless books. Later I learned that there were rules and structure that you had to play by. In this way writing became a game and in return this game generated my respect for authors and for books.

One misconception of my generation is that we don’t read books. In fact, much like the newspaper and music industries, the publishing industry is heading down a slippery slope and all fingers keep pointing to this “new generation” of blog-crazed young adults. Here are three reasons why it is not our generation’s fault that the book and publishing industry is in turmoil.

1. Blame old people not us.

Publishers are currently embracing and blaming new mediums like audio and ebooks for their downfalls. Unsurprisingly, unit sales are high but margins are too low to compensate for the decline in their printed counterparts. Products like Amazon’s Kindle and the Sony e-reader are undoubtedly gaining market share and interest but is it really from the tech savvy “millenials”? Studies are sparse but taking a look at this Amazon Kindle forum clearly shows that the facebook and ebook generations are decades apart.

2. Old school is new school.

Last year could have been mistaken for a film-noir homage to argyle sweaters, aviator glasses, and the cultural influences of the 40s and 50s. The year even saw an 89% rise in vinyl record sales thanks to 1000s of purchases by 18-30 year olds (and Radiohead). I’ll go out on a limb and say that books also belong in this category of fashionable rebirths. Today’s young adults find just as much satisfaction in reading a paperback and displaying it on their bookshelf as their parents and grandparents once did.

3. Blame the authors not us.

This last point is a slight exaggeration but let’s take Seth Godin as our unknowing case study. Seth is one of the most well respected marketers in the industry with a slew of popular books, a high traffic blog, and a number of public appearances under his belt. Most would think that his blog and appearances were merely supplemental, a marketing tool, to his books but he believes that less than 10% of his blog readers have read his published work.

Let’s put this another way: In the consumer’s eye, Seth’s brain droppings have multiple access points of equal importance and value. Seth’s blog is updated daily and his musings can be seen and heard with a quick search on YouTube. The ease of the web makes it almost too easy to avoid reading his books and end up with the same understanding of his theories. (I still recommend reading his books even if it’s just for the case studies)

You could substitute Seth for Tim Ferriss, Chris Anderson, or Malcolm Gladwell and arrive at the same conclusion. Oh and by the way, Tim is the only person on that list who could possibly be considered a “millenial” out of this group.

So stop using Generation Y as a default, catch all, pointy-finger-receiving, excuse for why an industry is no longer thriving!

Tagged as: Books, Generation Y, Publishing