iPad App Store has wide selection of education options

Some educational iPad applications are availabe at no cost in the Apple store.
Some educational iPad applications are available at no cost in the Apple store.

Technology experts say Apple’s latest gizmo, the iPad, won’t replace students’ laptops, but a menu of applications will help teach the periodic table, a range of languages, and a host of other K-12 and higher-education subjects.

More than 300,000 iPads were sold April 3 in Apple Stores and through pre-orders, Apple announced April 5, and education technology enthusiasts finally got to experiment with the device that Apple CEO Steve Jobs describes as a “game changer.”

The iPad App Store is stocked with more than 150,000 downloadable programs, including some that might catch educators’ attention.…Read More

Apple sells 300,000 iPads in first day

More than 300,000 iPads were scooped up by eager technology consumers during the device’s first day on store shelves, and iPad users already have downloaded more than 1 million apps and more than 250,000 eBooks from the iBooks store, USA Today reports. Huge crowds descended upon Apple Stores over the weekend to buy the new iPad. “The lines were much longer than we anticipated,” said Gene Munster, an analyst for Piper Jaffray. “The hype really helped Apple.” Prices start at $499 for a model with 16 gigabytes of storage and internet access via Wi-Fi. More expensive models with 3G cellular coverage for internet access will be available later this month. Available along with the new iPad are 1,000 new software applications that take advantage of the bigger 9.7-inch screen of the iPad. Many iPad customers were elated with their purchases. Anthony Camanelli, 43, who owns a Los Angeles limousine company, was the first to exit the Apple Store at the Grove shopping center in Los Angeles on Saturday morning with an iPad, after waiting in line since 4 a.m. He has three iPhones and bought the iPad to surf the web with a bigger screen. He has a Windows laptop, but says the iPad will replace that: “I got a new Mac computer for $500, and it looks awesome. The screen is crystal clear. It’s amazing…”

Click here for the full story

…Read More

Ohio bill calls for electronic versions of textbooks

Saying they could save more than 50 percent off the cost of textbooks, some House Democrats want to give Ohio college students the chance to trade in their piles of expensive books for laptops or other electronic readers, reports the Columbus Dispatch. Supporters of the bill—as well as the Ohio Board of Regents, which says it is neutral on the plan—say the key is convincing university faculty members that digital textbooks can work as well as the paper versions. Individual professors are responsible for choosing the textbooks used in their classes. Under the bill, the regents would have two years to require publishers to offer electronic versions of textbooks. Publishers also would be required to provide textbook formats for students with disabilities. “Our bill will use technology and common sense to lower the cost of textbooks on Ohio’s campuses,” said Rep. Matt Lundy, D-Elyria, who is sponsoring the bill with Rep. Matt Patten, D-Strongsville. “We can’t ask students and families to shoulder the unnecessary costs of excessive textbook prices.” Lundy said textbook costs increased an average of 6 percent per year from 1986 to 2006 and have risen 10 percent a year since. By delaying the electronic-materials requirement for two years, “we’ll be giving the publishers more than enough heads-up,” he said…

Click here for the full story

…Read More

Amazon threatens eBook publishers as Apple looms

As Apple builds its electronic bookstore, Amazon.com is trying to use its clout to hold on to its early lead in the market, reports the New York Times. Amazon.com has threatened to stop directly selling the books of some publishers online unless they agree to a detailed list of concessions regarding the sale of electronic books, according to two industry executives with direct knowledge of the discussions. The hardball approach comes less than two months after Amazon shocked the publishing world by removing the “buy” buttons from its site for thousands of printed books from Macmillan, one of the country’s six largest publishers, in a dispute over eBook pricing. Amazon is the largest online seller of printed books and the biggest eBook seller in the United States. The company is pressuring publishers just as Apple is also preparing to sell digital books for reading on its iPad tablet, which will reach the market in early April. Five of the country’s six largest publishers—Macmillan, Simon & Schuster, Hachette, HarperCollins, and Penguin—already have reached deals with Apple to sell their books through its iBookstore, which will be featured on the iPad. (The holdout is Random House…)

Click here for the full story

…Read More

Fending off the ‘digital decay’ of archived resources, bit by bit

As research libraries and archives are discovering, “born-digital” materials are much more complicated and costly to preserve than anticipated, reports the New York Times. Among the archival material from Salman Rushdie currently on display at Emory University in Atlanta are inked book covers, handwritten journals, and four Apple computers. The 18 gigabytes of data they contain seemed to promise future biographers and literary scholars a digital wonderland: comprehensive, organized, and searchable files, quickly accessible with a few clicks. But like most Rushdian paradises, this digital idyll has its own set of problems. Electronically produced drafts, correspondence, and editorial comments are ultimately just a series of digits written on floppy disks, CDs, and hard drives—all of which degrade much faster than old-fashioned, acid-free paper. Even if those storage media do survive, the relentless march of technology can mean that the older equipment and software that can make sense of all those 0’s and 1’s simply don’t exist anymore. All of this means that archivists are finding themselves trying to fend off digital extinction at the same time they are puzzling through questions about what to save, how to save it, and how to make that material accessible. “It’s certainly one of those issues that keeps a lot of people awake at night,” said Anne Van Camp, the director of the Smithsonian Institution Archives and a member of a task force on the economics of digital preservation formed by the National Science Foundation, among others…

Click here for the full story

…Read More

University library sees demand for Kindles soar

Oregon State undergraduates have flocked to the library's Kindle rental program.
Oregon State undergraduates have flocked to the library's Kindle loaner program.

For students looking to temper sober textbook readings with a literary escape into the world of vampires and zombies, Oregon State University is loaning out Amazon Kindle electronic readers stocked with the latest in popular books.

The Corvallis, Ore.-based university has found it too expensive to fill its Valley Library shelves with fiction and nonfiction books that students would read for fun, not homework assignments or upcoming exams. So in November, the university began lending Kindle eReaders to students and faculty willing to part from traditional page flipping and embrace a technology being tested on campuses nationwide.

The immediate demand for the electronic books forced Valley Library officials to alter Kindle policies created by a campus task force last summer.…Read More

Math of publishing meets the eBook

In the emerging world of e-books, many consumers assume it is only logical that publishers are saving vast amounts by not having to print or distribute paper books, leaving room to pass along those savings to their customers, reports the New York Times. Publishers largely agree, which is why in negotiations with Apple, five of the six largest publishers of trade books have said they would price most digital editions of new fiction and nonfiction books from $12.99 to $14.99 on the forthcoming iPad tablet — significantly lower than the average $26 price for a hardcover book. But publishers also say consumers exaggerate the savings and have developed unrealistic expectations about how low the prices of e-books can go. Yes, they say, printing costs may vanish, but a raft of expenses that apply to all books, like overhead, marketing and royalties, are still in effect.

Click here for the full story

…Read More

Princeton students, profs give Kindle mixed grades

One Princeton student surveyed said the Kindle was "difficult to use."
One Princeton student surveyed said the Kindle was "difficult to use."

Princeton University has released findings from its semester-long pilot of Amazon.com’s Kindle DX electronic reader, and the results appear mixed: While students reduced the amount of paper they printed for their classes by nearly 50 percent, some students and professors said they felt restricted by the device.

“e-Readers must be significantly improved to have the same value in a teaching environment as traditional paper texts,” a university press release said.

Students and faculty who were surveyed after the pilot program ended said they appreciated the portability of the Kindle DX, and the fact that it greatly reduced the printing and photocopying they did for their courses. But they said they missed the ability to highlight text directly, take notes, and flip back and forth through pages of their textbook easily.…Read More

Textbooks that professors can rewrite, digitally

In a kind of Wikipedia of textbooks, Macmillan, one of the five largest publishers of trade books and textbooks, is introducing software called DynamicBooks, which will allow college instructors to edit digital editions of textbooks and customize them for their individual classes, reports the New York Times. Professors will be able to reorganize or delete chapters; upload course syllabuses, notes, videos, pictures, and graphs; and perhaps most notably, rewrite or delete individual paragraphs, equations, or illustrations. While many publishers have offered customized print textbooks for years—allowing instructors to reorder chapters or insert third-party content from other publications or their own writing—DynamicBooks gives instructors the power to alter individual sentences and paragraphs without consulting the original authors or publisher. “Basically they will go online, log on to the authoring tool, have the content right there and make whatever changes they want,” said Brian Napack, president of Macmillan. “And we don’t even look at it.” In August, Macmillan plans to start selling 100 titles through DynamicBooks. Students will be able to buy the eBooks at dynamicbooks.com, in college bookstores, and through CourseSmart, a joint venture among five textbook publishers that sells electronic textbooks…

Click here for the full story

…Read More

Apple and e-book DRM: Will they? Should they?

With Apple already firmly entrenched in the realms of digital music and video, it was only a matter of time before the company got into the future of the printed word, reports Macworld. But aside from the few hints Apple CEO Steve Jobs dropped at the iPad unveiling last month, relatively little is known about the company’s forthcoming iBookstore. Case in point: will the e-books that Apple sells contain digital rights management? And, given that Apple has made such a big push to sell music free of DRM restrictions, should the company enforce it on books? Will they?

Click here for the full story

…Read More

Oops! We could not locate your form.