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This article in Advertising Age (@adage) by Jack Neff (@jackneff) begins, “If you thought of Generation Y as the digital generation, wait till you get a load of their kids.” This insightful research can help publishers prepare for the consumer who will be buying books 10 years from now, whatever those books will look like.

Pre-teen and even pre-school children are key drivers for adoption of the iPad and other tablet computers, and a substantial number of kids, including two in five 11 and 12 year olds, now regularly use social networks even though they're technically not allowed, according to the study LMX Family: A Window into the Media Life of the American Family (LMX stands for Longitudinal Media Experience) conducted in early February by Ipsos OTX (@ipsosnewspolls).

Ipsos also says pre-schoolers are adopting digital habits or being exposed to new devices even faster than tweens, a sign of the speed with which digital technology is reshaping media and marketing habits for the youngest children. Of households with preschoolers, 38% had handheld gaming devices vs. only 24% among those with children aged 6-12. Preschool households also held an edge in laptops (82% to 76%), gaming consoles (76% to 63%) and Internet-capable cellphones (69% to 65%).

The youngest children have the most exposure to digital technology because they’re more likely to have Gen Y parents shaping their expectations, says Donna Sabino, senior VP-kids and family insights for Ipsos OTX.

“People laugh when they see 3 and 4 year olds who are used to smartphones or tablet touch-screen devices going up to a laptop and touching the screen to make it move,” says Sabino. “When I see that, I think the technology is already obsolete for her. Her expectation is that all her interface with media is going to be intuitive, something she can touch. It's a history of the future right now — what are we teaching them to expect from us going forward?”

·         18% of parents will let their tween boys aged 9-12 play video games rated adult only, and 36% will let them play games rated mature, provided a parent is playing too.

·         20% of parents will let children 6-12 go with them to R-rated movies.

·         23% of children 6-12 regularly visit social networking sites and 41% of kids 11-12 do so, though membership in the sites is supposed to be limited to 13 and up.

·         By age 11, half of kids have cellphones. Half of the time it’s the parents’ idea.

·         Kids in the household are huge drivers of iPad penetration. 10% of households with children under 13 now have iPads, vs. only 3% in households without children 6-12.

·         35% of households with children 6-12 plan to purchase some brand of tablet computer in the next year.

·         Over half of parents say their children should be able to go online on their own by age 6.

Read this in full.

Also read our blogpost, "25% of Toddlers Have Used a Smartphone."

Dan Coates, president of Ypulse (@ypulse) says, “There's a fundamental shift in how media is being consumed, and Gen Y is at the epicenter of it all.”

·         In the prior week, nearly 1 in 4 members of Gen Y watched video content that was streamed to a computer, 1 in 7 downloaded video content to a computer, and 1 in 20 watched video content that was streamed to their mobile phones.

·         On average, Gen Y spends nearly 3 hours a week watching streamed TV programs, and an hour and a half a week watching downloaded TV programs.

·         Gen Y streams and downloads video from a variety of locations: they are nearly as likely to do so at home as they are at a friend's house.

·         Gen Y most commonly streams full-length, professionally produced videos, such as movies and TV shows, with music videos not far behind. College students watch a wider diversity of content than teens, with most checking out news clips, commercials, sports, and political videos in addition to long-form movies and TV shows.

He says, “The trend towards cloud-based, on-demand digital media shifts the locus of control from the producer to the consumer. Having grown up immersed in digital media, Gen Y will lead this shift.”

Read this in full.

What are the implications of these findings for publishers?

According to BtoB Media Business (@btobmagazine), “the users of iPads and other tablet devices are increasing their content consumption at a greater rate than individuals who don't own the devices, according to a survey released by L.E.K. Consulting (@LEK_Consulting).

The “Hidden Opportunities in New Media Survey” finds that 29% of tablet owners increased their use of magazines in the last year compared with just 4% of nontablet owners. Similarly, 26% of device owners said they increased their consumption of newspapers compared with just 6% of nontablet owners.

Read the study in full in pdf format.

E-Commerce Times says analyst firms are recalculating their 2011 PC sales projections after noticing a trend in which more consumers are passing on PC purchases in favor of tablets.

The above chart displays the results of the Google AdMob Network Survey.

What are the implications of the above study and analysis for publishers and other content creators? Write your comments below.

Happy Earth Day! In this New York Times (@nytimes) opinion article, Daniel Goleman and Gregory Norris ask, “Which is more environmentally friendly: an e-reader or an ‘old-fashioned’ book?”

Bill Henderson, in his Publishers Weekly (@PublishersWkly) column refers to The New York Times piece in saying,

Here's what an e-reader is: a battery-operated slab, about a pound, one-half inch thick, perhaps with an aluminum border, rubberized back, plastic, metal, silicon, a bit of gold, plus rare metals such as columbite-tantalite (Google it) ripped from the earth, often in war-torn Africa. To make one e-reader requires 33 pounds of minerals, plus 79 gallons of water to refine the minerals and produce the battery and printed writing. The production of other e-reading devices such as cellphones, iPads, and whatever new gizmo will pop up in the years ahead is similar. “The adverse health impacts [on the general public] from making one e-reader are estimated to be 70 times greater than those for making a single book,” says the Times.

Then you figure that the 100 million e-readers will be outmoded in short order, to be replaced by 100 million new and improved devices in the years ahead that will likewise be replaced by new models ad infinitum, and you realize an environmental disaster is at hand. We will have lost a chunk of our planet as we lose our minds to the digital juggernaut.

Here’s what it takes to make a book, which, if it is any good, will be shared by many readers and preserved and appreciated in personal, public, and university libraries that survive the gigantic digital book burning: recycled paper, a dash of minerals, and two gallons of water. Batteries not necessary. If trees are harvested, they can be replanted.

Goleman and Norris sum it up this way:

So, how many volumes do you need to read on your e-reader to break even? With respect to fossil fuels, water use and mineral consumption, the impact of one e-reader payback equals roughly 40 to 50 books. When it comes to global warming, though, it’s 100 books; with human health consequences, it’s somewhere in between.

You may also want to read MarketingDaily’s “Study: Green Gap Is Bigger Than Ever” and “Starbucks’ Green Goals: Cups Present Challenges.”

By the way, if you missed Earth Hour this year (Mar. 26), see the photos.

According to a study conducted in March by OnCampus Research (@CampusResearch), the research division of the National Association of College Stores, college students continue to increase their usage of e-readers, but most still prefer print textbooks. The survey of 655 students finds a 6% increase in ebook purchases in March compared to a study conducted in October, and more students are reading materials on dedicated reading devices while fewer are using laptops or netbooks. While only 15% of students say they own an e-reader, 39% report they use one, up from 19% in the October study. The number of students owning a dedicated reader in October was 8%.

Of those now owning a digital e-reader, the Amazon Kindle was the most popular, with 52% of college students owning one, compared to 32% five months ago. Other top e-reader devices included Barnes & Noble’s Nook (21%), Apple iPhone (17%), and Apple iPad (10%).

Students interested in purchasing a new e-reader are most interested in the iPad and Kindle (both 27%), followed by the Nook.

Print textbooks continue as the preferred media option among this demographic. Fully 75% of the college students in the March 2011 survey said that, if the choice was entirely theirs, they would select a print textbook. This is similar to the findings of the October 2010 e-reader survey, as well as one done in the fall of 2008.

Read the news release.

Sony is creating a flexible screen that’s thin and sturdy enough to be rolled while still showing video images. Samsung also has created a flexible OLED screen display:

Another application of a lithe monitor is the Rolltop notebook computer:

Acer has launched the Iconia-6120 Dual-Screen Touchbook, which USA TODAY says offers two touch-enabled 14-inch high-definition widescreen LED backlit LCDs:

And the two-screen Kno tablet is yet to come, as reported by Digital Trends:

Update (8/10/11): Kno is now software, not its own tablet. See "Kno Rolls Out New Features for Textbook App." 

What will flexible screens and dual monitors mean for publishing innovation? And how will you start preparing for it today? Write your comments below.

At MIT, Cynthia Breazeal and her team are building robots with social intelligence that communicate and learn the same way people do. Watch this 14-minute TED talk (@tedtalks & @TEDNews) to discover that when the infants of today become adults in 20 years, they’ll be interacting with robots as naturally as they do their peers.

What are the consumer and product implications of these technological advances on the future of the publishing industry? How far beyond ebooks will these innovations go?

As you know, our free online dashboard SomersaultNOW includes a tab for RSS feeds that focus on the future; articles trying to discern (and predict) what tomorrow will bring. We also "publish" the paper.li "newspaper" Somersault Futurist Daily News, to which you can subscribe. We include these because one of Somersault’s distinctives is to scan the horizon for coming trends and innovations to help publishers and marketers prepare for the possibilities ahead. The above video is just such an example. As you watch it, be thinking how the delivery of published content in the future will need to adapt and change, and what you should do today to get ready for it (and let Somersault help).

National Library Week (@AtYourLibrary) (#nlw11) is the annual event to promote local libraries and the quality service they provide to their communities. Library trends of the past year are detailed in The State of America’s Libraries, 2011, just released by the American Library Association (@alanews). Here are a few highlights reported in American Libraries magazine (@amlibraries):

·         The availability of wireless Internet in public libraries is approaching 85%, and about two-thirds of them extend wireless access outside the library. Computer usage at public libraries continues to increase.

·         Almost all academic libraries offer ebooks, as do more than two-thirds of public libraries. For most libraries, ebooks are only still a small percentage of circulated items – but represent the fastest-growing segment.

·         12% of academic libraries circulate preloaded e-reading devices, while 26% are considering it. (Kindle tops the device chart at 81%, followed by Sony at 34%, iPad at 28%, and Nook at 22%.)

·         6% of school libraries circulate preloaded e-reading devices, while 36% are considering it. (The Sony Reader leads the way at 64%, Kindle followed at 47%, Nook at 15%, and iPad at 4%.)

·         5% of public libraries circulate preloaded e-reading devices, while 24% are considering it. Kindle is the leader here.

·         Among academic libraries, social sciences is the discipline most likely to offer ebooks (83%), followed by science at 82%, technology (80%), humanities (77%), medicine (69%), and law (51%).

·         In school libraries, children’s fiction top the ebook charts at 51%, followed by reference (42%), children’s nonfiction (39%), children’s picture books (34%), and young adult nonfiction (24%) and fiction (23%).

·         In public libraries, adult nonfiction leads the way (86%), with adult fiction at 84%, bestsellers at 76%, young adult fiction at 69%, and children’s fiction at 56%. Young adult nonfiction, children’s nonfiction, reference, and children’s picture books “score” less than 50%.

·         A battle over the future of widely used ebooks was joined in March, when HarperCollins announced that it will not allow its ebooks to be checked out from a library more than 26 times, raising the possibility that ebooks that are not repurchased would be available at the library for only about a year. The ALA issued its response.

Read this in full.

Rebecca Miller of Library Journal magazine (@LibraryJournal) shares 10 favorite library locations as attractions in and of themselves:

·         Stephen A. Schwarzman Building, New York Public Library, New York City

·         Fayetteville Public Library, Fayetteville, AR

·         Seattle Central Library, Seattle, WA

·         Geisel Library, University of California-San Diego, La Jolla, CA

·         Thomas Jefferson Building, Library of Congress, Washington, DC

·         Weippe Public Library, Weippe, ID

·         Harold Washington Library Center, Chicago Public Library, Chicago, IL

·         Boston Athenaeum, Boston, MA

·         Deadwood Public Library, Deadwood, SD

·         Central Denver Public Library, Denver, CO

Read about these library locations in full.

As a publisher, agent, or author, how are you networking with your local library? Comment below.

Click to enlarge this Infographic by Column Five (@Columnfive) to view statistics regarding the mobilization of today’s digital native and his/her comfort level with consuming content (news, but by implication & extrapolation, also books) electronically.