[LINK] Strategy is one for the e-books

[Tom Worthington]

On 07/07/11 14:54, David Boxall wrote:
> ... 
<http://www.smh.com.au/digital-life/computers/blogs/bleeding-edge/latest-strategy-is-one-for-the-ebooks-20110707-1h40j.html>?

That is "Latest strategy is one for the e-books" by Charles Wright, July 
7, 2011, 2:13PM:

"LAST week Bleeding Edge had one of those life-changing epiphanies that 
completely alter one's relationship with technology.

We read an article in The Chronicle of Higher Education ... about the 
way publishing technologies could reduce the costs of textbooks for 
university students and dramatically change study methods. ..."


This was a slightly entertaining, but mostly silly article, suggesting 
that e-books will make textbooks cheaper and change education.

The E-book technology itself will make little direct difference to the 
cost of higher education textbooks, as most of the cost is not from 
printing or distribution of the books: it is profit for the publisher 
and royalties for the author. E-publishing may help by making the 
absurdly high price of some textbooks look even more absurd. University 
lecturers will be under increased pressure to provide their lecture 
notes free for download via the course web site, rather than charging 
hundreds of dollars for a printed version in the university book store.

In terms of revolution in education, having animated images in books is 
useful, but this is not the education revolution. The revolution comes 
when the student can communicate with other students, and with their 
teachers, on-line. The students then educate each other, with the 
teacher helping. You do not need much more than text messages to do that.

ps: I am shopping around for postgraduate qualifications in tertiary 
teaching, so I can be on the front line of the education revolution: 
<http://blog.tomw.net.au/2011/07/postgraduate-certificates-in-tertiary.html>.


-- 
Tom Worthington FACS CP HLM, TomW Communications Pty Ltd. t: 0419496150
PO Box 13, Belconnen ACT 2617, Australia  http://www.tomw.net.au
Adjunct Senior Lecturer, School of Computer Science, The
Australian National University http://cs.anu.edu.au/courses/COMP7310/
Visiting Scientist, CSIRO ICT Centre: http://bit.ly/csiro_ict_canberra