Old people love Kindle

Citing this Amazon forum, Publishers Lunch Deluxe reports:

We extracted about 75 percent of the responses on age (representing about
700 responses, taking equally from the earliest and most recent postings,
which show very similar age distributions). Per John Makinson's quip at an
LBF panel, over half of reporting Kindle owners are 50 or older, and 70
percent are 40 or older. Here is the full age bracket distribution:

0 – 19: 5%
20 – 29: 10%
30 – 39: 15%
40 – 49: 19.5%
50 – 59: 23%
60 – 69: 19.5%
70 – 79: 6%
80+: 2%

The comments themselves are as illuminating as the numbers. So many users
said they like Kindle because they suffer from some form of arthritis that
multiple posters indicate that they do or do not have arthritis as a matter
of course. A variety of other impairments, from weakening eyes and carpal-tunnel-like
syndromes to more exotic disabilities dominate the purchase rationales of
these posters. Which in turn explains Amazon's pseudo-statistical case that
e-book purchases are incremental/additive, rather than cannibalistic of
their print sales. Countless people report being able to read much more
with Kindle because it overcomes physical obstacles or limitations that had
made reading difficult for them previously.

I thank S. for the pointer.

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