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Apple's January Event to Focus on Publishing and eBooks

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So how will this affect online students? I am an online student and my school requires that I purchase their eText books. If I purchase a text book from apple my school will still require I purchase theirs. I have a feeling this will be an issue with online universities.
 
Watershed year

With all the pieces in place, look for 2012 to be the year we really gain ground in the mobile ad space!
 
smoledman said:
Current textbook apps for iPad are very bad. I expect Apple not only to unvail iPublishing, but a new TextBook app to defeat all current apps. It will become THE way college students study. Imagine having a searchable annotations per textbook instead of having to use little sticky notes!
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I've been doing that for a while now. It's called OneNote.

The biggest problem with textbooks is the price. Why are students, who are typically poor, having to fork out so much for these texts. I get told by my lecturers that these books are "Essential" and we'd be needing to use them "Nearly every day for study." Well I'm in final year and I haven't purchased as text book since first semester which has saved me $2000 and counting.

To be honest, I don't find the iPad to be too useful as a study tool, at least not for engineering. It's awkward for equations and diagrams. I much prefer my wacom tablet hooked up to my macbook pro running OneNote through a virtual machine with textbook excerpts and lecture notes printed to each file.... Just a nicer way of doing things :)
 
Michael Scrip said:
A lot of colleges and universities in the USA give laptops to all incoming freshmen. (I'm sure it's included in your tuition... but whatever)

I guess they want every student to have a computer... even though many students barely use their laptop outside of Facebook. Maybe for the odd term paper here or there.
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Yes a lot of schools here give laptops or net books also and bundle it into the overall price. However not the universities. We pay per subject here, the only requirement was to enrol in at least 3 subjects past census date otherwise you get invoiced for the iPad or have to return it. I believe the faculty paid for them as the number of students taking up science degrees were decreasing in numbers, so it swayed people who were on the fence.

But it I agree, most people used it to play angry birds during lectures :S
 
Object-X said:
Sure hope this is true and that Apple can apply the same rules to textbooks as to regular ebooks. E-Textbooks sort of suck right now. I don't like the renting model. Charging over $200 for a single textbook is a rip off, and charging over $100 for 6 months of digital access isn't any better. At the very least they should give you the PDF copy. I wouldn't mind the rental model if it applied to all textbooks like the way some music services work.
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That's the whole idea of getting rid of any physical media.
Everything is in the iChump iCloud with Apple's 30% shakedown sticker on it.
Magic. :apple:
 
I am as much of a fanboy as the next, but I'm really starting to think that Apple will never release another band new product. What was the last one? The original iPad.
 
mrbib said:
As long as we are posting rumors I think Apple signed a deal with the NYC public school district or a University and will be providing textbook in ipad format for all students. All student will be leasing a ipad for the school year and will be partially subsidized by the publisher and Apple. Publishers will be saving a lot on printing cost and Apple will sell a heck of a lot of iPads.
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No way this has anything to do with the NYC Public Schools. Apple would never work through that bureaucracy and political quagmire. And even if they did, that would only work if EVERY textbook was available for the iPad. Apple doesn't subsidize anything – they wouldn’t even setup free WiFi in Cupertino or open an Apple store there. There are 1 million NYC public school students. You think Apple (or the publishers) is going to subsidize 1 million students? And what happens when a student loses their iPad or gets mugged on the subway for it? Or when it breaks?

Furthermore, basal textbook publishers have a vested interest in keeping the status quo because what they really make their money on is consumables, like workbooks. Ebooks make consumables go away.

This is probably just an announcement of a deal with several NYC-based textbook publishers (probably college publishers) to make their materials available in the iBookstore or it’s the announcement of some kind of better toolkit to develop enhanced eBooks.
 
wikus said:
Does anyone remember when Apple used to focus on making GREAT computers with OS X?
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Have they stopped building those? I wasn't aware... Saw quite a few of those at the Apple store over the weekend...
 
eye said:
I'm really starting to think that Apple will never release another band new product. What was the last one? The original iPad.
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The iPad was introduced in 2010, it's not exactly that long ago.

Was there some product you were hoping for in particular? If you are a fanboy, then you will know Apple announcements never live up to the hype. But they always manage to produce better products than the competition.
 
Winni said:
It's rather a very expensive schoolbag that only wealthy parents can afford. It's certainly not for the majority of this world's population.
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Umm... have you seen the prices of some college text books recently? Two semesters of saving money that would be spent on text books at the college I'm going to go to could get you a 64GB WiFi only iPad 2. Add up the rest of the savings made on buying reduced-price digital copies over the two years I plan on going there, and however many years I go to a university, it's cheaper to get an iPad (assuming you don't feel the need to upgrade every year, which I hopefully won't)
Most could save even more by getting a used 16GB version, which I will probably end up doing.
 
Eolian said:
Possible Bloomberg financial services tie-in to iPad, via Fortune this morning.
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Bloomberg also reported Apple wil reduce the price of the wifi only iPad soon. This makes sense in a connected classroom.

Also Apple STILL makes new iPhone 3GS for goodness sake! So it makes sense they would keep iPad 2 lines open for reduced price wifi only units to serve price sensitive markets.

Schools have an extended buying procedure.

Rocketman
 
I hope a lending feature arrives, like Kindle has; not so much for lending to friends (although that could be important) but for libraries!

I really like how Overdrive/Kindle allow me to check out library books remotely, but I fund the iBooks reader itseld to be a bit better than the Kindle reader; plus the Kindle library process is quite unpolished and hairy (Overdrive is better in that way but is a poor reader). I’m sure Apple would streamline things.
 
Gregintosh said:
Hopefully we will be able to read iBooks on our macs now, its kind of ridiculous that you need an iOS device to read a book and that a beautiful 11, 13, 21, or 27 inch screen on a Mac is deemed unworthy of displaying text.

A web-based interface would also be nice if someone decides to use another platform for mobile devices, kind of like Amazon now provides.

Apple needs be as ubiquitous as Amazon in this department to catch up. Otherwise, even Apple fans like me will buy books from Amazon forever.

(I feel safer buying from Amazon Kindle store since I know I can always access/read my Amazon content from anywhere and any device, where as with iBooks I know I'll only be able to read them on my iPad/iPhone).
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Absolutely. Anywhere, any device. And don't forget, Kindle is cross platform as well. Mac, PC, iOS, Android...
 
G4DP said:
Have you not noticed you have to pay Apple for the pleasure of something to keep these books on?

What happens if the battery dies? You going to ask the lecturer to stop and wait so you can plug in your iPad and wait for it to have enough charge to work?

What happens if the HD goes and you are without the iPad for a few days?

A lecturer will not give you an extension because of something so stupid and easily avoidable.

If a few text books are too heavy for you, maybe you should invest in a gym membership and not an iPad?
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These are issues that extend beyond the iPad into the entire digital realm for students. What if my laptop dies in the middle of class, how am I expected to take notes? Simple. I charged it beforehand because I know I needed it for class. And if I'm really unfortunate and have been using it before class and run out of battery half way through, there is a plug on every desk. The modern (college) classroom has been redesigned for the modern student, and the iPad fits into that well. If you drop it and break the screen, well that sucks but thats your problem (does the new Apple Care that covers 2 broken screens cover iPads too? This is a good point, if students are using this for textbooks, they should get some extra security against a broken screen). Borrow a friend's iPad for a night, just like you would with a textbook if you lost one of your own.

As for your first comment, have you purchased college textbooks lately? The expenses for one semester can often exceed the price of the most inexpensive iPad. Textbooks are insanely overpriced. You could argue that apple products are too, but I would rather pay $500 for something that I can put my textbooks on AND use every day for thousands of other reasons than spend that same amount of money on some books I'll read a few times and then sell back for less than half what I paid for them.
 
I like the idea that this could be used for textbooks, the current offerings are crap... although if they are priced at £70 a book then forget it, I'll buy the paper one so I can sell it when I am done.
 
DTphonehome said:
Remember when Apple was nearly bankrupt?
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Of course we do, that was prior to them concentrating on making great computers with OS X. ;)

OS X came after Apple returned to solvency.

----------
MarcelV said:
Have they stopped building those? I wasn't aware... Saw quite a few of those at the Apple store over the weekend...
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Keyword : Focus. You seem to have missed that part. ;)
 
george-brooks said:
These are issues that extend beyond the iPad into the entire digital realm for students. What if my laptop dies in the middle of class, how am I expected to take notes?
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This is a radical idea but what about using a pencil and notebook? :)
 
Well George, in response to your questions.

I just Googled the prices of Text I used during my degree. The minimum price is $153. Which is elements of Cartography.

Doing a quick scan the cost per year would today be more than $1000.

I would still rather have the text book. A book doesn't smash when you drop it. A book doesn't break if someone drops something on your bag by accident.
 
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