A new report by Bowker says
that fewer books are being published in print formats, but that digital publishing is on the rise due to the economic slowdown and the rise of ebook technology.
With publishers cutting back new releases in response to declining sales, an estimated 275,000 traditional books were released in the United States last year, a drop of about 9,000 from 2007, according to Bowker, a New Providence, N.J.-based company that compiles industry statistics.
Categories with the biggest reductions included travel, religion and biography, Bowker said Tuesday.
The number of print on demand books soared to 285,000 in 2008, which is the first time that POD outnumbered print books. These numbers represent the number of books published, not the number of books that are sold or that people are actually reading.
