Much as I cling to paper, our publisher (Avalon) is fearlessly navigating us into the new world of ebooks. Virtually all of my books are available as ebooks, except for Europe 101, European Christmas, and our phrase books. Twenty of my Snapshot Guides (excerpts of big guidebooks sold as smaller, cheaper, more portable and focused guidebooks) are sold only as ebooks, including Salzburg, Helsinki, Milan, and France’s Loire Valley. Electronic versions of my various guidebooks are generally ready for sale about three months after publication of the print version.
In general, Rick Steves ebooks are sold for every type of ereader, but there are some exceptions. Europe Through the Back Door is available only for use on the Barnes & Noble Nook, and Best of Europe is sold only in Apple’s iTunes. That’s because our publisher makes these exclusive for these companies for more enthusiastic promotion. On my website, you’ll find a list of which Rick Steves ebook titles are available in which format.
Everyone is salivating for the day when old-fashioned guidebooks come souped up, with extra video and audio features. For 2012 editions, five of our ebooks will be “audio-enhanced” (with audio tours): the city guides for Paris, London, Rome, Venice, and Florence.
As for video enhancement, Apple is attempting to embed video clips into Best of Europe, and may succeed any day now.
Most Rick Steves ebooks are in black and white, because most ereaders don’t display colors. On the iPhone, iPad, and the new NookColor, the color maps and color photos in our ebooks do appear in color.
In the next month or two, our publisher will start selling iPhone apps of 10 books: Italy, Spain, France, Germany, Great Britain, Ireland, London, Paris, Florence, and Rome. These will be content-heavy, each consisting of a 600- to 1,000-page book, including maps but not photos.
On paper, this May we are releasing a series of full-color Pocket Guides (glitzier, pocket-sized versions of our Rome, Paris, and London guidebooks). At this point, these will not be available as ebooks or apps.
Ebook and app sales currently constitute only about 4 percent of all Rick Steves book sales. Yet nearly everyone would agree that this market will only grow.
The major players are Kindle, Nook, and Apple’s iBooks; Sony is losing ground. While ereaders are great for novels and books you cuddle up with and read straight through, I find them not yet guidebook-friendly; they don’t allow for easy page-flipping and hyperlinking. They’ll get there someday soon.
It’s expensive to figure out better ways to make ebooks more user-friendly, and any innovations are quickly picked up (read: stolen) by competitors. I keep encouraging my staff to stay focused on what we do best ‘ generating content ‘ and not be distracted by the ever-unfolding electronic market. Thankfully, to keep from losing market share in this emerging field, my publisher is committed to maintaining an ebook presence as well as striving for a better electronic product for our travelers. As long as they’re spending the money to keep up with this, we’ll happily continue to generate the best content in travel publishing.
Bottom line: Whether you’re traveling with your guidebooks in electronic format or in print, equip yourself with good and up-to-date information, expect yourself to travel smart…and you’ll have a great (and affordable) trip.
I always thought that if someone wanted to counter the agenda of the forces in our country peddling fear and make America more progressive and open to the world, they would simply give people determined to build walls passports and plane tickets. I’ve also thought that about the best investment the rest of the world could make in the interest of everyone’s well-being would be to establish a fund to give each American a trip to a foreign land of their choice (not Canada) upon graduation.