iPhone & Mac Programming Books In Demand
Tech specialist publisher O’Reilly is reporting encouraging growth in iPhone (s aapl) and Mac programming book sales, despite an overall drop in computer book sales.
On the O’Reilly Radar blog, Mike Hendrickson analyzed figures from Nielsen Bookscan retail sales data. This is data collected in the U.S. from bookstores like Barnes & Noble (s bks) and Borders (s bgp), or online from Amazon (s amzn).
The Nielsen figures make for depressing reading, illustrating how the computer book market has seen a steady decline in sales since mid-2008. Hendrickson notes there are “few signs the book-buying slump is going to turn around anytime soon.” In total, the market saw more than half a million fewer units sold in the first half of 2009 than were sold in the same period last year (the red line in the graph below.)

O'Reilly Report - Computer Books 2009 First Half Unit Sales
Only eight subjects (from a list of over 100 categories) saw a year-on-year increase in sales by the end of the first half of 2009. “The market performance this year is the worst we’ve seen since the fall of 2001,” Hendrickson said. Read More about iPhone & Mac Programming Books In Demand