The day is not far off when the boxes of books you must sift through every time you move will no longer force you to throw away all but the essentials for the sake of cargo space. Everything will available on an e-book reading device as memory capacity increases on each generation of devices. Amazon's Kindle and other readers with WiFi capability provide the portability desired for those who read on the go, whether for entertainment or education. The advantages are obvious but the paperback generation clings to the secure warmth of a book in the hand that can be read at a relaxed pace without the sterile computer interface.

It is surprising how fast e-books have become popular in 2011; at the same time it is also surprising how slowly e-books became popular. The last generation of physical paper book readers is now about to give way to the Kindle crowd who are ready to give up the accumulation of paper books and accept the digital bookshelf with its enormous memory possibilities.

For this reason the Kindle reader has programmed in special easy-on-the-eye fonts, off-white e-paper, and e-ink that will give a softer reading experience. In the Kindle 3 version the outer casing color has been changed from white to graphite to produce less contrast to the grayish paper screen, leaving a comfortable surface on which to read.

The turning point for e-book popularity became evident with the statistics published by a Book Industry Study Group (BISG) series of 3 surveys over nine months showing that e-book sales went from 1.5% of total US book sales in 2009 to 5% in the first quarter of 2010. This "Survey of Consumer Attitudes Toward E-Book Reading" indicated that 37% of e-book readers bought their first one within 6 months of the survey. They also said they were buying fewer paper books.

The numbers of converts are large percentages, indicating that e-books will take over the industry much as e-mail made much of the postal service industry obsolete. The declining sales of paperback and hardback editions will drive up the cost due to smaller production runs. Those who can't afford an e-book reader are becoming a smaller group now that you can buy a Kindle for under $200. Once the device is there, e-book sales are assured. There will probably come a day when the reader will be free with a package of best book titles for your favorite genre or some such service, similar to the way that cell phone companies offer free phone models, creating an upgrade market.

The price of a published novel will be much lower since the manufacturing process and raw materials like paper and ink industry are not part of the overhead. This affects everyone concerned, especially authors who will then get smaller royalties from a book that is perhaps one-third or one-fourth the retail price of the paper equivalent. On the good side, the author can create any number of web sites to promote the book through search engine optimization. With Google search capabilities on cell phones the highest-ranking sites can link the searcher with the Amazon page or publisher for instant download.

The top 10 most popular e-book reading devices are the Kindle 3, Kindle GX, BeBook Neo, Barnes & Noble Nook, Barnes & Noble Nook Color, Sony Reader Touch Edition PRD 650BC, Alex eReader, Sony Reader Daily Edition PRS 950SC, Pandigital Novel, and Kobo eReader. The significantly lower price and high quality of the Kindle 3 ensures its popularity for the foreseeable future.