Here is a rather long-winded but interesting article on various predictions of the death of print, and how things look at the present time. Spoiler — print isn’t dead, nor is it likely to die any time soon.
Digital subscriptions, while growing smartly, still represent only a tiny slice of the market, and a lot of magazine readers don’t seem eager to switch to e-versions. A survey of owners of iPads and other tablet computers, conducted earlier this year, found that three-quarters of them still prefer to read magazines on paper.
As I’ve said before, we’re several years into this so-called revolution and print still shows no signs of dying.
I’m sure my “print is not dead” talk can make me sound like a Luddite. I’m not. I love technology as much as the next guy.
But there’s a point at which facts actually matter. Despite years of breathless talk about the death of print and how everybody is going to be reading on electronic devices, it simply isn’t so.
Yes, there’s been an increase in readership on electronic devices. The Kindle is a wonderful thing. I love to clip web articles to Evernote so I can read them on my phone later.
We were probably mistaken to think of words on screens as substitutes for words on paper. They seem to be different things, suited to different kinds of reading and providing different sorts of aesthetic and intellectual experiences.
E-editions have their own niche in the world. So does print. And it will remain that way for a long time.
Read the whole article I link above. There’s some interesting stuff toward the end about how our brains process words on paper differently than words on a screen.