Reading Audio Readers

The first computational study of readers and reading to focus on audiobooks, this book uses a unique and substantial set of reader consumption data,to show how audiobooks and digital streaming platforms affect our literary culture. Offering an academic perspective on the kind of user data hoard we associate with tech companies, it asks: When it comes to audiobooks, what do people really read, and how and when do they read it?Tracking actual audiobook reading on the level per user and hour, this book combines computational methods from cultural analytics with theoretical perspectives from book history, publishing studies, and media studies. In doing so, it provides new insights into reader behaviour in digital platforms, the effects of the audiobook boom, and the business-models for book publishing and distribution based on streaming and subscription.