Apple iPad Already Beating Amazon Kindle?

Throughout the past couple of years, we heard about lots of devices that were expected to put Amazon Kindle to sword and ends its dominance in the e-book market. Of course, none has come close to getting it done. Wouldn’t it be ironic to have a device that hasn’t even been released to the market beat Amazon Kindle so handily in a head to head match-up? That’s what Apple iPad has done according to the latest report by ChangeWave. According to Investors.com, 40% of e-book readers fans are more likely to buy an iPad. That easily beats the crowd that will stick by Amazon Kindle (28%).

Credit: Investors.com

Perhaps it’s more alarming for Amazon to see that 27% of people who own an e-reader currently would have gone with Apple iPad had it been available for sale. This isn’t good news for B&N and other e-book readers (e.g. Plastic Logic’s Que Reader) either. I firmly believe that we have the next leader of e-reader market in Apple iPad. Not because it’s better equipped for reading e-books on the go, but the fact that Apple’s marketing machine can top anything Amazon can put up. Besides, Apple has been smart about iPad’s release. The company hasn’t rushed the device to the market and is slowly gaining support for the device among publishers. That’s something other Kindle competitors never accomplished.

Will Apple dominate the e-book reader market for long? It’s tough to say. The market is still growing, and there will be better devices and more exciting content partnerships in the future. But you can be sure that Apple will be around if iPad 1.0 is a success by any means.

Your take: if you were to pick up an e-book reader and the iPad was available for sale, which e-reader would you go with?