Textbook Publishers Strike Deals to Bring Content to iPad

[thirteen1031]

Speaking of disrespectful, I pay my own tuition, thank you.

Then you're just wasting your time and the teacher's. As for being "disrespectful"--once again, "Boo-hoo-hoo!" My assumption that you weren't paying your own tuition was because anyone who is chatting and on facebook while taking lecture notes, anyone that disrespectful of their teachers, devaluing their efforts and the opportunity for a higher education, is acting like a spoilt teen who is probably still living and being supported by parents.

If you don't want to be mistaken for this, if you want to be respected as an adult, then I suggest you act like one.

 

[ShiftyPig]

Then you're just wasting your time and the teacher's. And if you want me to be respectful of you, I suggest you tell me that you've stopped being so disrespectful of your teachers by going on facebook and chatting with friends during their lectures. I don't know where you're going to school, but many of these schools have underpaid and overworked teachers or TA's, temporary lecturers, and such who work very, very hard to present their knowledge to students and help those students succeed in the world.

You deserve no respect at all if you are disrespecting them in such a way. Believe me, they know you're when you're not really giving them your full attention. And every time they sense that you're only listening a little, they become less and less interested in giving you their best. Because why bother if you're only willing to invest a third of your attention in what they have to teach you?

I'm at one of the top law schools in the Southeast. Trust me, I'm not learning from underpaid TA's. My professors are on tenured, 6-figure per year contracts. Two graduated form Harvard Law, one from Yale, and the other from Texas.

Generally, most of their energy goes into Socratic Methodizing one student at a time. When I've read a case and show up prepared for class, I don't feel obligated to be attentive when someone fails to do so and is read the Riot Act in front of 99 other students.

 

[cmaier]

I'm at one of the top law schools in the Southeast. Trust me, I'm not learning from underpaid TA's. My professors are on tenured, 6-figure per year contracts. Two graduated form Harvard Law, one from Yale, and the other from Texas.

Generally, most of their energy goes into Socratic Methodizing one student at a time. When I've read a case and show up prepared for class, I don't feel obligated to be attentive when someone fails to do so and is read the Riot Act in front of 99 other students.

I attended engineering school in 1988-1996, and no one brought laptops to class. I went to lawschool in 2003-2006, and everyone did - massive culture shock for me. I was shocked and a bit dismayed to see everyone IMing, facebooking, playing solitaire, etc while I was busy updating my outlines and briefs in response to discussion in class. The primary reason for my shock was that law school is very expensive and presumably everyone had made a decision to be there and no one was being forced. I was on scholarship, but even I didn't want to waste my opportunity.

But karma works. Most of those slackers got bad grades. Several never passed the bar. Many are not working as lawyers. I ended up number 1 in the class which- to my surprise- actually matters when looking for work even many years out of school (unlike in engineering).

 

[frjonah]

Pricing...

As others have pointed out, it seems like a travesty to offer e-textbooks at the full printed prices when the material cost percentage for printed materials is so high... actually, imo, it just comes across as greed.

 

[dru`]

Have you never read a book on an actual e-reader before. They're that dull color for a reason. I don't know about anyone else but after working on my computer staring at the screen my eyes ache.

I'm at an iMac up to 16 hrs a day 7 days a week. Most days my eyes are fine. I keep the screen at lowest brightness. I can't handle anything higher. My eyes will pain. It took awhile to adjust when I switched to a glossy C2D from the matte G4 and there are times when I still feel the C2D is too bright at it's lowest setting.

I personally don't think iPad will be a problem to read on.

 

[cmaier]

As others have pointed out, it seems like a travesty to offer e-textbooks at the full printed prices when the material cost percentage for printed materials is so high... actually, imo, it just comes across as greed.

In a free market economy, prices are determined by supply and demand, not by cost of manufacture

 

[etmister]

Let's hope that this will also evolve the textbook into something new that has text as one component. Animation, video, audio, slideshows, and games can now all be part of a digital content package. This may be more relevant for the K-12 market, but it would be a great disappointment if we did not see the death of the traditional textbook with a device like the iPad.

 

[avonterr]

Textbook annotation

Some features for iPad textbook app:

* Allow text selection (like on the iPhone) to be highlighted within the textbook.
* Collect all highlighted passages into "My study guide" which can be reviewed later -- with links back to the full text.
* Allow annotations by typing or by dictation -- use voice recognition to convert dictation to text.
* Permit import of selections and annotations from other students in my study group.
* Build in hooks to chat/e-mail so I can ask my study partners or professor about a selected passage.
*Multimedia online with videos, quizzes, etc.