<p>I was in Borders yesterday and I looked at the new E-Book. I liked it but I will have to compare it to the Kindle. I liked the way you can swipe the screen with your index finger and the motion is not unlike turning a page. I have been imagining how great it will be for kids and college students to do away with heavy textbooks. Are electronic books the future for textbooks?</p>
<p>I read an article about this a few months ago, and there were two problems with putting textbooks on e-readers: 1) it’s hard to do pictures, so science textbooks, etc, can’t be done now, and 2) page numbers are not consistent, so it’s hard to attribute references and use an index.</p>
<p>The article said that the e-book people were working on these problems, but they weren’t going to be easy to fix.</p>
<p>I do love the idea, though!</p>
<p>For one class I teach, I have an electronic textbook that is a fraction of the price of the regular book. Students can print off pages if they so wish. And I like it because I can add my own commentary and notes to the pages themselves.</p>
<p>What is most interesting to me is that 95% of my students end up buying the optional hard copy and won’t just work with the e-version, despite the giant difference in cost and the fact that I don’t care which version they use. I find it interesting that they still want the paper.</p>
<p>Can you highlight on e-books?</p>
<p>I could read a book for fun electronically and have. I think I would have a hard time with an electronic textbook. I like to make notations, bookmark pages with stickies, etc. All things I imagine you can do with the electronic version also, but I just like the feel of a book in my hands and seeing those stickies hanging out of the pages.</p>
<p>In addition, although my kids are not yet in college, they are in private schools and I find I can usually get new or like new copies of most of thier textbooks are huge discounts over what the bookstore charges. So hard copies are not necessarily more expensive than the electronic versions. </p>
<p>I did look into a Kindle for my kids last year and found the cost of the electronic books high. I am not familar with the one mentioned here though.</p>
<p>I just completed an online Economics class where the access card enable me to access and read the text book online. I had a hard copy of the prior edition of the book from my son. I personally found I really disliked reading the book digitally and understood much better reading the hard copy. I am sure it should not make a difference as the words were the same. But for me it was vastly different. I don’t know how an ebook would differ to reading it online. But I suspect ebooks are not for me.</p>
<p>Probably a generational thing.</p>
<p>Most of my reading assignments are large excerpts from books that my professors have scanned and made available online for us to use. I have to print them all off. I agree with this:
“I like to make notations, bookmark pages with stickies, etc. All things I imagine you can do with the electronic version also, but I just like the feel of a book in my hands and seeing those stickies hanging out of the pages.”</p>
<p>If I just need to read something to get the gist of it I can read it online, but if I really need to fully understand and get absorbed in something, I need to have a hard copy in my hands. I can’t really explain. I always assumed it was just because of my vision, easier to see something looking down at it than across a desk, but I think there is also a difference in being able to remember something I’ve literally had my hands on vs something I just looked at on a screen and then it disappeared. It just has a totally different feel to it.</p>
<p>Well put. You expressed exactly how I feel.</p>
<p>S2 has an e-textbook for a science class this sem. It was almost half the price of the reg. book.</p>
<p>I recently studied for a very difficult certification where material was in multiple media…on-line, e-book, paper back book, self led study test program that programatically led you through your weak areas, e-tests. I also could have taken a lecture style class - one of those boot camps directed at helping you pass the final test -but I didn’t. (I passed! but learning is so different as an adult!)</p>
<p>I still found myself making index cards. There is something about thought transferring into tactile writing that helps me cement the learning. My D1 does the same thing still, regardless of having e-media. I still also found myself preferring the paper back book, and I keep it in my office and refer to it frequently. But, during studying, I used various media - depending on convenience.</p>
<p>I am sure this is learning style related - we all take it in differently. Looking forward to when D2s LLBean rolling bookbag weighs less. She can definitely do a lot of her assignments with on-line texts, but I wonder how learning styles influence media use.</p>
<p>There is nothing better than on-line databases (JSTOR! etc) though for research - what a blessing. May they never know microfiche.</p>
<p>I haven’t yet tried an e-book, and I’m not really tempted. I love the way books feel.</p>
<p>^^My 22 yr. old S1 says the same thing. He’s an avid reader and says he likes turning the pages.</p>
<p>I think that text book publishers would rather rent you the e-book so that you’d pay a subscription price and the book would be inaccessible after a certain period of time. Another issue is if you want to loan your book to someone. With an e-book, it’s all or nothing. If your e-book gets stolen or lost, then you lose everything as opposed to just one text.</p>
<p>One other major concern that textbook publishers have is that someone will hack the security on e-books. Not too big a problem if authors do new editions very quickly.</p>
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<p>I have an Amazon Kindle. If I lose my Kindle, or it is stolen, it must be handled like a credit card. I’d have to cancel it quickly so that the person who had it couldn’t order any books. However, all books purchased through Amazon remain “on file” there, so to speak, so I could recover all my books if I decided to purchase another Kindle.</p>
<p>I’ve only bought one book so far from another source, and it’s downloaded to my computer, so I wouldn’t lose that one either.</p>
<p>I think those of us raised with regular books might have trouble using e-textbooks vs. e-books for pleasure simply because we’ve created some pretty ingrained habits with regard to the learning process.</p>
<p>Young people raised with e-books will probably do just fine with them. I think eventually that’s how textbooks will be used in the future.</p>
<p>I also have a Kindle. Yes, you can highlight on it. I love it. I really do think this is the future of textbooks. The technology will just be more and more refined every year. I really love my Kindle - the instant gratification of having a book the minute I want it is very satisfying. And a few months ago, one of my daughters, a high school sophomore, desperately needed a copy of Beowulf on a Sunday night, well after the library and bookstores had closed and she had returned her copy to school. In 2 minutes, I had it on my Kindle (for free, since it’s in the public domain). It demonstrated its worth to me in that moment.</p>
<p>Couldn’t she have just pulled it up on a computer or smartphone?</p>
<p>I agree with those who want to feel the book and need to have it in hand in order to fully absorb it, yet I love the Kindle. It does have the feel to me. Its inability to convey a decent picture is definitely a drawback though. It must be a bandwidth issue as the screensaver is a fabulous picture, so I think that will be solved soon with the advent of more powerful networks.</p>
<p>I have a Kindle DX and I can see pictures on mine with pretty good clarity. Black and white, though.</p>
<p>I’m getting a B&N Nook for the holidays and am very excited. I already read books on my iPhone when I travel. Honestly, I could see wanting both options - the eBooks so you don’t have to lug everything around, but the hard copy books on those occasions where you did want to spread everything out.</p>