Honestly, I wouldn't be shocked. Textbooks, and I'm open to being wrong here, are as expensive as they are because of the extra time it takes to get the content together and right and fit into specific studies. So if they're inherently supposed to be more expensive, then why not?Anybody want to bet on an announcement of fairly broad availability of academic textbooks for iDevices... but at about the same pricing as existing printed editions?
I bet the pitch is convenience and reducing the (backpack) load over cost savings (including a lack of ability to re-sell the textbooks when the semester ends).
I'm sure some students will love the convenience aspect (and yet another argument to drive whey they need an iPad/iPhone/iPod).
I would say Digital Ink is technology that is too new. It is not yet capable of doing those things you listed (or not very well).
I know this is really random and off-topic, but do you know that Apple was named Apple because it was Steve Jobs' favorite fruit, or is your sig just for the sake of the tongue-in-cheek joke?