digitizing education: a primer on ebooks - educause homepage

5
39 July/August 2001 EDUCAUSE review Books 38 EDUCAUSE review July/August 2001 Education A student makes the traditional pilgrimage to the campus bookstore with a new class schedule in hand. In previous semesters, she would have snaked through long, winding lines to buy used, highlighted, dog-eared textbooks. This time, however, she logs on at one of a dozen computer kiosks, enters her authorization number, slides a debit card through a machine, and leaves the bookstore with a very different set of readings. Be- sides one traditional textbook (price, $65), she also leaves with two customized printed books. One consists of a few chapters from several standard textbooks (the book smells “fresh” because it was printed the night before). It cost only $27. The other customized book comprises a chapter from a traditional textbook, two case studies from various professors, and a white paper written by the professor teaching the course. This book cost about $20. In addi- tion to these paper documents, she also picked up at the bookstore a customized CD simply itizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing g Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing itizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing g Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing itizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing g Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing itizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing g Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing itizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing g Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing itizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing g Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing itizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing g Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing itizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing g Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing itizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing g Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing itizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing g Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing itizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing g Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing itizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing g Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing itizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing g Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing itizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing g Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing itizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing g Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing A Primer on D I G I T I Z I N G e By Michael A. Looney and Mark Sheehan Michael A . Looney, Ph.D., is Senior Director for Education and Government Marketing at Adobe Systems Inc. Mark Sheehan, Ph.D., is Executive Director for Information Services and Chief Information Officer at Montana State University–Bozeman. The authors want to thank Paul Lesinski of A&R Partners, Peter Lyman of the School of Information and Management Sciences, University of California–Berkeley, and Judy Brown of Academic Advanced Distributed Learning Co-Lab, University of Wisconsin. © 6/01 Ferruccio Sardella

Upload: others

Post on 03-Feb-2022

1 views

Category:

Documents


0 download

TRANSCRIPT

39July/Augus t 2001� EDUCAUSE r e v i e w

Books

38 EDUCAUSE r e v i e w � Ju l y/Augus t 2001

EducationA

student makes the traditional pilgrimage to the campus bookstore with a new classschedule in hand. In previous semesters, she would have snaked through long, windinglines to buy used, highlighted, dog-eared textbooks. This time, however, she logs on atone of a dozen computer kiosks, enters her authorization number, slides a debit cardthrough a machine, and leaves the bookstore with a very different set of readings. Be-sides one traditional textbook (price, $65), she also leaves with two customized printedbooks. One consists of a few chapters from several standard textbooks (the book smells

“fresh” because it was printed the night before). It cost only $27. The other customized bookcomprises a chapter from a traditional textbook, two case studies from various professors, anda white paper written by the professor teaching the course. This book cost about $20. In addi-tion to these paper documents, she also picked up at the bookstore a customized CD simply

itizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing g Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizingitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing g Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizingitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing g Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizingitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing g Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizingitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing g Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizingitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing g Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizingitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing g Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizingitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing g Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizingitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing g Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizingitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing g Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizingitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing g Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizingitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing g Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizingitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing g Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizingitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing g Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizingitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing g Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing Digitizing

A Primer on

D I G I T I Z I N G

eBy Michael A. Looney and Mark Sheehan

Michael A . Looney, Ph.D., is Senior Director for Education and Government Marketing at Adobe Systems Inc. Mark Sheehan, Ph.D., is Executive Director for Information Services and Chief InformationOfficer at Montana State University–Bozeman. The authors want to thank Paul Lesinski of A&R Partners, Peter Lyman of the School of Information and Management Sciences, University of California–Berkeley, and Judy Brown of Academic Advanced Distributed Learning Co-Lab, University of Wisconsin. ©

6/0

1 F

err

ucc

io S

ard

ell

a

Palm Computing (http://w w w. p a l m . c o m / ) , a n dHandspring (http://www.handspring.com/) offersoftware for reading eBookson handheld devices thatuse the Palm operating system.

Current eBook softwarehas many advantages overdedicated eBook devices. Ifthe publisher or author al-lows it, eBooks accessed byeBook reader software maybe printed, loaned, or givenaway to friends or col-leagues. Materials read inthis way may also be anno-tated, bookmarked, digitallys e a r c h e d f o r w o r d s o rphrases, and updated viathe Internet by the pub-lisher or author. Further-more, text-to-speech andother audio options can behighly valuable for vision-impaired students or for in-ternational students withdifficulties reading English.eBook reader software en-ables eBooks to become dy-namic with rich embeddedmedia—with animations,audio, video, links to theWeb, and links betweenseparate but related eBooks.Embedded media can in-clude a video of a facultylecture explaining a partic-ularly important or chal-lenging concept; it can be as i m u l a t i o n o f a t h r e e -dimensional object like aheart or an Egyptian artifact;or it can be a piece of musicor sounds from the rainforests of South America.4

Effective eBook softwareenables the digital eBook tomirror the printed book,with graphics, equations,photos, charts, and illustra-tions vividly displayed amidthe text in the same formatand layout as the eBook’sprinted counterpart. This isespecially important in edu-

cation, where graphics areinvaluable tools for convey-ing dynamic, abstract con-cepts such as molecularbonding or the subtleties oftone and shading in a workof art. Also important is theability to print portions ofthe eBook . Many peopleprefer hard-copy formats;printed eBooks can satisfythat sensual craving for thefeel and smell of paper. On a broader scale, the processof creating an eBook can alsor e s u l t i n a P r i n t - O n -Demand (POD) book, whichcan have the same look andfeel as the hard copy but canbe customized by content.POD books can be printed insmall batches, vir tuallyovernight. The appearance,including the cover, is al-most indistinguishable fromthe original printed hardcopy.

One potential concernabout eBooks involves intel-lectual property rights. Whatmeasures are in place to pre-vent eBooks from being re-produced and shared inways that violate copyrightprotections? This potential“Napsterizing” of textualmaterial has, until recently,been a major barrier to entryinto the electronic market-place by many publishers,including university presses.In addition, faculty authorsof supplemental or cus-tomized materials need to

protect their own intellectual property.eBook encryption technology has begunto ease authors’ and publishers’ fears.Publishers and authors need only to add asecurity layer and assign permissions to awork to market it as an eBook. Typical se-curity software locks the eBook to thepurchaser’s computer so that it cannot beprinted, copied, or forwarded to othercomputers without payment or “permis-sion” (unlocking content without a fee).Rights-protection software is also becom-ing increasingly sophisticated; now, whilemaintaining very high levels of security,the author or publisher can allow thereader (buyer) to lend the eBook for se-lected periods of time (though witheBooks you never need to worry aboutwhether you’ll get the book back, becauseyou select the period of lending!). Thenew protected digital content can also beset to “self-destruct” after the end of a se-mester. This alone allows the develop-ment of completely new business modelsfor texts and supplemental materials.Electronic distribution schemes canallow an entire book or only a certainnumber of pages to be printed over aspecified period of time (e.g., ten pagesevery week). The eBook encryptionmethodologies may even be set to givethe book away to a specified number ofusers. As rights protection software in-creases in sophistication, more and moreoptions will become available to facultyauthors, publishers, and readers.

The eBook revolution has spawnedseveral new support businesses: compa-nies that provide DRM technology; con-tent conversion houses, which aid pub-lishers in converting existing print andelectronic content to eBook formats; andsystem integrators and clearinghouses—such as Lightning Source (http://www.lightningsource.com/), Recipro cal(http://www.reciprocal.com/), iUni-verse.com (http://www.iuniverse.com/),and OverDrive (http://www.overdrive.com/)—which provide encryption, host-ing, and e-commerce integration servicesto authors, publishers, and resellers. Before long, specialized rich-media authoring services, copyright clearing-houses, and digital object vending services will also be established. Besidesthese service providers, online resellerssuch as Amazon.com and Barnes &

41July/Augus t 2001� EDUCAUSE r e v i e w

marked “English Literature of the 18thCentury” and two 3x5 index cards onwhich are printed URLs for campus Websites—one suggesting materials stored inthe digital library on campus, and theother directing her to supplementary ma-terials available only on the campusbookstore Web site.

Back in her dorm room, the studentconnects to the Internet and finds an e-mail from the bookstore waiting for her.Following links within the e-mail, shedownloads the electronic version of thephysical textbook that she just bought for$65. She sees that electronic versions ofher two new customized books are avail-able for just $2.50 and $10 respectively;she downloads these to her laptop as well.She visits the Web addresses listed on her3x5 index cards and selects some of theadditional materials available there. Mostof these ancillary materials are free but“protected” (though she notes that for stu-dents at other institutions, there is a $3.50charge). Finally, while she is organizingher new digital textbooks using softwareon her laptop, the student receives an-other e-mail. This time, the message con-tains an attachment from her chemistryprofessor, who, with one mouse click, hassent a sixty-five-page digital course packand supplemental reading materials to aclass of 150 students. The total cost of allthese paper and electronic materials isroughly 30 percent less than what shewould have paid for the same course ma-terials just a semester before, almost allare accessible both electronically and inprint, and most impressively, she now hasroom in her backpack for something be-sides books and study guides.

In the near future, this student maycarry a single handheld device containingall the materials she needs for all herclasses, not to mention a full complementof relevant reference materials. She willdownload and interact with these materi-als by using software that allows her tobookmark and annotate content, conductquick searches, and look up words in anintegrated dictionary that can read wordsand phrases back to her in syntheticspeech. She will connect wirelessly to theInternet from links within her electronicmaterials. Of course, she will be able toprint portions of her digital course books(if authored and published by campus

faculty members) anytime she likes. Newelectronic reading material for her se-quence courses will contain links back tothe electronic content from previous se-mesters, still stored on her reading device,for quick review and reference. She willalso experience a richer learning experi-ence made possible by embedded audio,video, three-dimensional animation, andtools for collaborative learning.

This is not a new vision. Educators andvisionaries have been imagining the ulti-mate learning hardware and software forsome time, presenting even more futuris-tic scenarios (notable examples beingVannevar Bush’s 1945 “Memex”1 andAlan Kay’s “Dynabook” from thirty yearsago). But neither is this a scene from a fu-turistic novel. Electronic reading materi-als—“eBooks”—are real today, and manyother elements of the vision are onlymonths away. Digital learning content isabout to overtake the education market-place and change the way we distributeand interact with information and, ulti-mately, the way we learn.

Pieces of the eBook Puzzle: Gadgets, Software, Digital Content, and SecurityWhat exactly is an “eBook”? Dependingon whom you ask, an eBook either is a de-vice specialized for displaying electronicreading material or is software designedto display such material. We’ve beenreading digital content on “glass” foryears, of course. The recent surge in at-tention to eBooks relates to the fact thatdigital rights management (DRM) soft-ware tied to electronic commerce is nowavailable. By enabling the protection ofintellectual property in electronic for-mats, DRM software is revolutionizingthe availability of digital content. In turn,software and hardware companies havebegun exploring specialized readingtechnologies to take advantage of contentpreviously unavailable in digital form.

The eBook phenomenon has beenhyped by the press as being about popu-lar trade paperback books, such asStephen King’s eBook experiments withRiding the Bullet. In reality, eBooks canspan a vast range of types of content.Short stories, plays, research reports,manuals, textbooks, speeches, white pa-pers, course packs, and distance learning

materials all make great eBooks. All thesematerials can now be encrypted, acquiredfree or for a fee, and displayed with spe-cialized readers (either software or hard-ware) that make reading electronicallymore viable than ever. Admittedly, we’re along way from replacing the aesthetic feelof a printed book; however, for readerswho read for information and who aremobile, the benefits so outweigh the dis-advantages as to ensure that the era of theeBook has begun.2

Dedicated eBook devices—includingthe Franklin eBookMan, Gemstar eBook,goReader, and others—are gadgets thatyou hold in your hand while reading digital content. These devices cost be-tween $125 and $600 and include dic-tionaries, backlit screens, and friendlyuser interfaces that make for a near-paperreading experience. They are limited incertain ways—for example, the user maybe unable to print parts of the eBook con-veniently or to share or lend the digitalfiles even if the eBook publisher agrees toit. In addition to these dedicated readingdevices, multifunctional “tablet PCs” andother light-weight, high-resolution de-vices are being made or designed. Withthese devices, electronic reading will be atleast a secondary feature by virtue of ex-ceptional screen resolution, handy navi-gational features, and specialized readingsoftware.3

In the meantime, tens of millions of PCs, but especially Windows and Macintosh laptops, make excellenteBook devices through the use of free,downloadable software featuring toolsfor individualizing text-resolution pref-erences. The current eBook readers forPCs provide a means for literally everyfaculty member and student with a PC toexplore this new way of accessing bothprotected and nonprotected electroniccontent. Adobe Systems Inc. (http://www.adobe.com/epaper/ebooks/main.h t m l ) a n d M ic ro s o f t ( h t t p : / / w w w.microsoft.com/reader/default.asp) haveboth introduced software for readingeBooks on desktop computers and lap-tops. Another version of the MicrosoftReader product runs on handheld pocketPC devices manufactured by Hewlett-Packard, Casio, and Compaq. Like-wise, Adobe (http://www.adobe.com/products/acrobat/readerforpalm.html),

40 EDUCAUSE r e v i e w � Ju l y/Augus t 2001

“Napsterizing”of textualmaterial has, untilrecently, been a majorbarrier toentry into the electronicmarketplaceby manypublishers.

Noble have begun vigor-ously marketing eBook con-tent , and online college bookstores will start to dothe same fairly soon. Finally,specialized system integra-tor companies will soon beassisting libraries with inte-grating eBooks into theirlending systems.

How eBooks Add Value to EducationeBooks (in the broad senseof electronic content) areideal for the academic envi-ronment. A number of so-cial and economic factorsmake eBooks or digital con-tent preferable to paper text-books and course materi-a l s — o r a t l e a s t h i g h l ydesirable as adjuncts tothese materials. First of all,eBooks provide a means fornontextbook course adop-tions whether the material isa trade book (nonfiction, bi-ography, etc.) or customizedcontent authored by the fac-ulty member or colleagues.This is particularly appeal-i n g f o r u p p e r- d i v i s i o ncourses, in which textbooksare used less frequently.

In addition, textbooks ineBook format can be mademodular. This will allow thefaculty member to review afifteen-chapter textbook andsimply select the three orfour chapters that are rele-vant to a course. This modu-lar selection can be offered

electronically and as a PODbook in the bookstore, witheither option costing con-siderably less than the priceof the complete printed textbook.

Another distinct advan-tage of eBooks is the equalityof access to learning materi-als they provide to both thecampus-based and the dis-tant learner. Students whoare literally anywhere in theworld will have access to thesame content that is avail-able to the student on cam-pus, whether that access isthrough the faculty Website, the college bookstore,or the digital library. Fur-thermore, with dictionaryplug-ins and automatedtext-to-speech technology,the eBook reader softwarecan greatly benefit studentswhose primary language isnot English. Similarly, stu-dents and faculty of foreignlanguages, as well as inter-national students in theUnited States, will be able toaccess digital content in realtime from a broad range ofcountries, whether it be aManga comic from Japan oran original, native-languageversion of a scholarly publi-cation from France.

The eBook format alsoopens the door to the manyprecious and rare docu-ments that are currentlyunder lock and key in col-lections around the world.Typically inaccessible to theaverage student, these willbecome available, as digitalrepresentations, to any stu-dent in any location. Severalexamples of these rare pub-lications, now available aseBooks, can be experiencedat t h e O c tav o We b s ite(http://www.octavo.com/).

A s p r e v i o u s l y m e n -tioned, eBooks can be en-riched with a broad range of

media types to help with the learningprocess. For example, MIT’s Sloan Schoolof Management is already preparing“Knowledge Updates,” brief research up-dates from MIT faculty. Complete withvideo, audio, and potentially animatedmaterials, these updates are current re-search snapshots intended as much foralumni, corporate customers, and friendsof Sloan as for current students.

Keeping current is an additional ad-vantage of eBooks. For courses on cutting-edge technologies or current af-fairs, textbooks are out-of-date theminute they are printed. eBooks can en-able daily, weekly, or monthly updates viathe Internet. This would eliminate out-of-date textbooks and would help the stu-dent and instructor stay on top of devel-opments relevant to their courses.

eBooks can also improve on qualitiesof traditional printed books. Like a paperbook, the eBook will become markedwith highlighting, with page cornersturned down for quick reference, andwith notes made in the margins of thepages. The difference with the eBook isthat all of these aids will be the user’s ownamendments rather than the vestiges ofthe learning habits of previous owners. Inaddition, the digital medium is often sim-ply more convenient or appropriate as ei-ther a replacement for or an adjunct tothe potentially heavier, environmentallyunfriendly paper medium.

Finally, another factor that may influ-ence the adoption of eBooks and otherdigital courseware is the financial modelused by traditional textbook publishersand the financial burden this model im-poses on students. The average price of anew textbook in 1998 was almost $62,5

and this price is anticipated to increase4–6 percent per year. This represents anearly 500 percent increase since 1965.Contributing factors to this worseningeconomic scenario include the fact that24 percent of all academic books are re-turned to publishers from college book-stores6 and the fact that each purchasedbook is turned over six times or more onaverage before it is out of circulation. As aresult, one-third of students buy usedbooks,7 and one-third do not even pur-chase the book required for the course.Only 10 percent of textbook sales are tointernational markets,8 due increasingly

42 EDUCAUSE r e v i e w � Ju l y/Augus t 2001

eBooks canenable daily,weekly, ormonthlyupdates via theInternet,eliminatingout-of-datetextbooks.

tary variation of OEBF. Many OEBF-based books should be scrutinized by ac-ademics in particular to ensure properformatting and true pagination (e.g., foraccurate references).

AccessibilityThe acceptance of eBooks by the highereducation community will be directlyproportional to ease of access. The bur-den here falls on back-end fulfillment.Textbooks, course books, and other digi-tal learning materials need to be as easy tofind, buy, obtain, and use as booksbought at a conventional college book-store or found in the campus library. En-cryption security needs to be effective butinvisible. With a seamless, one-clickeBook purchasing or lending experience,students will be excited to switch to digi-tal. If the process is slow or complicated,eBooks will not catch fire on campus. Ac-quiring eBooks needs to be as simple andas attractive as acquiring and managingMP3 files.

Campus and public libraries will playa major role in the distribution of digital

content, especially as specialized lendingservices become available through theDRM schemes.9 Many library consortia,such as the Perseus Project (http://www.perseus.tufts.edu/), have beenworking for years to digitize a wide rangeof content. Also, a number of new aca-demic information service businesseshave emerged, such as eBrary (http://www.ebrary.com/) and netLibrary (http://www.netlibrary.com/).

The Adobe and Microsoft eBook read-ers both provide direct access to onlinedigital content via “bookstore” naviga-tional buttons. These buttons can be eas-ily altered by users to link to their desiredsources of content. Students and facultycan access content from their libraries,from their online college bookstores(even if fulfilled by a distributor like Fol-lett or the National Association of CollegeStores), from an academic departmentand/or academic computing, from pub-lishers, or from traditional online book-stores and specialty digital content ven-dors such as eBooks.com (http://www.ebooks.com/).

ReadabilityA great reading experience is the last keyto the success of eBooks on campus. Theburden here lies with the technologyused to read the eBook, be it the device orthe software. Simple but crucial issueslike the weight, size, and general look andfeel of an eBook device can make or breakits success. Both Adobe and Microsofthave adopted font-rendering technologyfor use on color LCD displays (CoolTypefrom Adobe and ClearTypeTM from Mi-crosoft), allowing users to customize thesharpness of the font to their particularpreferences. Other factors, like higherscreen resolution on PCs and forthcom-ing reading devices, will accelerate theadoption of eBooks.

eBook reading on the desktop PC orlaptop will also be affected by Internet access, compatibility with operating sys-tems, ease of use, and look and feel. By itsnature, eBook reading software needs tointeract well with the computer on whichit is installed, with no crashes or compati-bility issues. The overarching questionwill be, does the eBook experience

45July/Augus t 2001� EDUCAUSE r e v i e w

to hard-copy piracy as the costs of booksincrease. All of these factors, coupledwith bookstores’ and publishers’ profitmargins, lead to textbook prices that insome cases are higher than the tuition forthe course. Through the utilization of aneBook “workflow” process that can lever-age not only eBooks but also POD booksand modular content, eBooks are an op-portunity for academic textbook pub-lishers to provide students with contentthat is of higher value and is potentiallyless expensive.

What Will Make eBooks Successful in Education?Three major factors will be required tomake eBooks successful generally andalso in higher education: content, accessi-bility, and readability.

ContentWithout electronic content, there is no eBook . Quality and quantity of content will together form the most criti-cal factor in the success of the eBookphenomenon. In the education space,

content comes from two main sources: (1)author- educator-publisher teams and (2)educators themselves, publishing inde-pendently. Textbook publishers aremoving rapidly to provide previouslypublished content in digital formats. Atthe same time, faculty are exploring authoring their own materials for elec-tronic distribution as eBooks (encrypted to protect the author’s intellectual prop-erty and made ready for transactional e-commerce). Beginning this fall, a number of major academic publishers—including Addison Wesley, Harcourt,McGraw Hill, and Houghton Mifflin—will offer leading textbooks in an op-tional digital format, along with a varietyof study guides, solution manuals, andother supplemental material. Publish-ers’ exp erimentation will provide instructors with greater modularity andindividualization of content selectionwhile simultaneously offering higher-value content to students.

Using a variety of relatively inexpen-sive authoring and desktop publishingsoftware, instructors are now able to com-

pile digital course packs, supplementalreading materials, and syllabi and to savethese materials as secure files that theydeliver to their classes via e-mail. Also,many colleges and universities alreadyhave collections of instructor-writtencontent, which may be converted to se-cure, interactive course books by univer-sity presses using DRM software.

To supplement the authoring ofeBooks with existing tools, eBook-specific authoring software is emergingthat will leverage the desire for richmedia, embedded digital objects, andrights management options. For digitiza-tion of legacy print material, screen-capture software and text distillers cancreate eBooks from their paper form.Most books published within the lastseven years have been created digitallyand translated to Postscript for printing.These files are the most readily availablefor conversion to eBooks. The othermajor format being proposed for eBooksis the Open eB ook Forum (http://www.openebook.org/) XML-based for-mat. Microsoft’s .lit format is a proprie-

44 EDUCAUSE r e v i e w � Ju l y/Augus t 2001

E D U C A U S ESTRATEGIC INITIATIVES FUND

For more information:[email protected]

A small group of corporate friends providesundesignated funding to support EDUCAUSEexplorations in new areas of strategic importance.These gifts make it possible for EDUCAUSE toremain on the leading edge in matters of utmostimportance to higher education.

EDUCAUSE thanks those companies thatcontributed to this fund in the year 2000:

▲ IBM Corporation▲ Oracle Corporation▲ SAP Public Sector and Education

EDUCAUSE and its higher education membersappreciate the support of their corporate commu-nity. We will continue to build unique and meaning-ful forums to bring corporate leaders together withtheir colleagues and customers in higher education.

enhance or detract from thestudents’ experience andeducation? If it detracts, itwill be a short-lived experi-ment. If it lives up to its mas-sive potential, learning willchange forever.

Moving ForwardAt this point, some final is-sues still have no real resolu-tion, including copyright,implementation, and de-mand. Regarding copyright,when an instructor creates acourse pack using existingpaper materials, he or shecould be in violation ofcopyright law if the selec-tions go beyond fair use. Inmigrating to the digitalworld, similar rights issueswill need to be addressedthrough the publisher andevolving copyright law. Spe-cialty digital object identifierclearinghouses are emergingto address this need.

The question about im-plementation is, who withinan academic institution isresponsible for bringing aneBook program to life? Sofar, no pattern has emerged.A librarian, a progressive in-structor, an MIS depart-ment, or even a student-runcoalition could gather thenecessary momentum to getan eBook program off theground.

Finally, will students orinstructors be the mainforce behind the move to

eBooks? Who will make upthe demand? Students wereclearly the driving force be-hind PCs in schools. In a re-cent survey at the Universityof California–Berkeley, 81percent of students said theywere willing to use an onlineorder system as a means topurchase their course read-ers, because they appreci-ated the convenience andwere already accustomed tomaking online purchases.10

Will they now adopt eBooksas a digital medium for thesesame course readers, or willthe movement be led by theadministration and faculty?Faculty dictate the content oftheir courses; will they alsoinsist on selecting the media(digital, POD, print) for con-suming that content? IfeBooks are the medium ofchoice, who on campus willactually do the authoring,publishing, and distribut-ing? The faculty? Media centers in concert with thefaculty member? Will theeconomics of providing content for the classroomand for the distance learnerb e g i n to f u n d a m e n ta l lychange our notions of in-structional media so that intwenty years, we will remem-ber the $65 hardbound text-book in the way that some ofus remember mainframepunchcards?

In a model familiar fromother initiatives on campus, across-interest committee canquickly investigate the eBookoptions available and assessthe most effective way tomeet the approaching eBookrevolution. The process thatis used to begin personal orinstitutional experimenta-tion is relatively inexpensivebecause the software eBookreaders for PCs and Macs arefree for personal use and forposting on campus Web sites

for student and faculty downloading.Content of all kinds is already availableboth for free and for fee. Distribution andintegration into e-commerce, library, andauthentication systems are more complexissues.

Several study groups and organiza-tions have already done significant investigative work, notably the Universityof Virginia Library’s Electronic Text Center (http://etext.lib.virginia.edu/) andBrown University’s Scholarly TechnologyGroup (http://www.stg.brown.edu/). Acommittee from the California Digital Li-brary has also released a study oneBooks.11 In general, college and univer-sity librarians and academic computingpersonnel are likely resources to explorethe topic further. At this early stage, a fewpassionate, resourceful groups or indi-viduals are likely to start the movementon a grass-roots level. But before weknow it, the student mentioned at thestart of this article will be the norm, notthe exception. e

Notes1. Vannevar Bush, “As We May Think,” Atlantic

Monthly, July 1945. See <http://www.isg.sfu.ca/~ d u c h i e r / m i s c / v b u s h / > a n d < h t t p : / / w w w .cs.brown.edu/memex/>.

2. Daniel P. O’Brien, “Books Unbound,” Forrester Re-port, December 2000.

3. Steven Levy, “Bill Gates Prescribes a Tablet,”Newsweek, April 10, 2001.

4. All of these elements, from an entire book or on-line learning module to a simple audio file, can beidentified with a DOI® (Digital Object Identifiers,<http://www.doi.org/>) and/or a SCORM™

(Sharable Content Object Reference Model, <http://www.adlnet.org/>). These emerging standardsprovide for a vast range of access and linking op-tions within and among documents. The notion ofa “digital vending machine” (asset managementwith optional e-commerce) is inevitable.

5. Campus Marketplace, the newsletter of the NationalAssociation of College Stores, as quoted in RobertS. Lazich, ed., Publishing by the Numbers (Detroit:Gale Group, 1998), 133.

6. Statistical Service Center, Book Industry Trends,1999: Covering the Years 1993-2003 (New York: BookIndustry Study Group, 1999).

7. Albert N. Greco, The Book Publishing Industry(Boston: Allyn & Bacon, 1997), 182.

8. Standard & Poors, “Industry Surveys: Publishing,”May 25, 2000, 22.

9. See <http://skyways.lib.ks.us/central/ebooks/libraries.html> (accessed May 21, 2001) for a sum-mary of library-based eBook activities.

10. Chan Jean Lee and Rosa Ren, “User Survey Re-sults,” Course Reader Purchase Preference Survey,School of Information Management and Systems,University of California–Berkeley, 2001.

11. California Digital Library, Joint Steering Commit-tee for Shared Collections, “Ebook Task Force Re-port,” March 2001, <http://www.cdlib.org/about/publications/> (accessed May 21, 2001).

46 EDUCAUSE r e v i e w � Ju l y/Augus t 2001

Facultydictate thecontent of theircourses; will they also nowinsist on selecting the media for consumingthat content?