It's every Luddite's biggest nightmare: For the first time, electronic versions of hardcover books have out-performed Amazon's physical versions, the company announced on Monday. Amazon’s chief executive, Jeffrey P. Bezos, said it's "astonishing when you consider that we’ve been selling hardcover books for 15 years, and Kindle books for 33 months." Users at the site, which represents a significant portion of U.S. book sales, purchased 143 Kindle books for every 100 hardcover books in the last quarter—including hardcover books for which there is no counterpart edition—and in the last month that number swelled to 180 Kindle books for every 100 hardcover books. Sales figures don't include free Kindle books, and though paperback purchases weren’t disclosed, it’s likely that they continue to outnumber e-books.
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