Books, of the E- and other varieties

One of the things that many commentaries about the new e-book readers mentions is that they will be the death of print books. However, in one hour this afternoon I performed the following actions: downloaded a handful of e-books to my Kindle (one pay, several public domain for free), pre-ordered one hardback book and bought one hardback and one paperback from Amazon, and put a hold on one book via my local library system.

If other e-book reader owners are having similar experiences to mine, then I think the future of the physical book is not in any immediate danger. I won't argue that the business model of publishing won't change, as fewer copies of those hardback books may be sold, but I suspect that it might end up looking more like the recording industry, where die-hard fans of a band buy CD's online or at shows (because no one can autograph an .mp3) while lots and lots of other buy the digital downloads.