E-Books and E-Textbooks

1
E-Books and E-Textbooks

• Possibilities and pitfalls of academic digital
  monographs

Tara Radniecki Niamh McGuigan
Focus on Teaching and Learning Loyola University
Chicago Spring 2012
2
E-books

• Sales worldwide in 2011 3.2 billion
• Predicted up to 50 of all books sold in the US
  will be e-books by 2014
• Sales worldwide predicted at 9.7 billion by 2016
• 2011 Horizon Report name e-books as an emerging
  technology poised to enter mainstream higher
  education within the year.

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History of the e-book

• 1971 Project Gutenberg
• Internet as a syndication tool
• 100th e-book in 1994
• Over 36,000 titles today
• 1987 Perseus Digital Library (Tufts University)
• 1990 Library of Congress begins American Memory
  Project
• 1991 First CERN web servers go online

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History of the e-book

• 1996 Internet Archive
• 2,355,344 items in text collection (as of
  1/11/12)
• 1998 NetLibrary is the first commercial
  publisher
• 2004 Google Book Project
• 2011 Amazon sells more e-books than print

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Print advantages

• Print is easy to use
• No power or Internet connection required
• Nothing can break, crash, shut down, become
  unresponsive
• No need for accounts or passwords
• People dont need to be taught how to use books

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Print advantages

• Clear ownership rights
• When you own a book, you can do what you want
  with that book.
• Lend it to someone else, write in it, carry it
  around, use it whenever you want.
• Preservation
• Books are durable
• Books are easy to store

7
Print advantages

• Reading Experience
• Research indicates that print formats may promote
  a higher quality reading experience
• Books allow physical interaction - note taking,
  bookmarking, flipping back and forth

8
Print disadvantages

• Preservation
• Despite being durable, books do get worn,
  damaged, written in
• Books take up a lot of space
• Limited format options
• Books only contain material that can be printed
  on a page

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Print disadvantages

• Access
• One reader at a time
• Time needed for libraries to order and process
  books
• Time needed for patrons to retrieve a book from
  the stacks
• Portability
• Books are heavy!

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E-book advantages

• Access
• Multiple users (in most cases)
• Quick or immediate purchasing and processing for
  libraries
• Quick or Immediate access for patrons

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E-book advantages

• Portability
• Theres no need to carry an e-book around with
  you
• In most cases, an e-book can be accessed from any
  computer and from different types of devices.
• In many cases, e-books can be loaded onto a
  portable device and used without an Internet
  connection.

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E-book advantages

• Reading Experience
• Searchable
• Format allows inclusion of content in multiple
  media
• Potential for more interactivity
• Format allows linking to other resource

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E-book disadvantages

• Not always easy to use
• Requires a device of some sort - computer,
  tablet, e-reader, etc
• Requires Internet access
• Requires a lot of administration in the form of
  accounts, passwords, proxy access
• Concerns about e-books and the visually impaired
• Digital Divide

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E-book disadvantages

• Ownership isnt so clear
• Restrictions on how e-books can be used
• Limits on the number of users or the number of
  uses
• Limits on the ability to print, copy, or download
• Restrictions on what type of patron can use the
  book

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E-book disadvantages

• Preservation
• Libraries face many unknowns in preserving
  e-books
• Will archived e-book files always be usable?

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E-book disadvantages

• Reading Experience
• Screen reading may not match print reading
  experience
• Many users, including students, prefer long form
  reading in print
• Cost
• In the library world, e-books usually cost more
  than print books
• E-books can also come with hidden administrative
  costs

17
Academic e-books

• Content type varies Reference to fiction to
  serials to anthologies to technical manuals and
  more.
• Loyola ended FY2011 with over 350,000 e-books
• Continues to grow with patron driven acquisition
  and subject specialist collection development
• E-books _at_ Loyola University Libraries
• E-books Subject Guide

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Scholarly e-books possibilities for the future

• University presses are exploring new models
• Institutionally supported open access publishing
• Free online/pay for print
• Digital Culture at University of Michigan
• University Press e-books consortia
• Project Muse and JSTOR

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Scholarly e-books possibilities for the future

• E-book creators exploring new formats and
  content
• Woolf Online
• Mark Twain Project Online
• Rotunda from UVA Press
• Butterflies and Moths of North America

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Textbooks characteristics

• Content
• Dense, complex ideas
• A small slice of a much larger topic/discipline
• Images tables, illustrations, etc
• Format
• Chapters Sections digestible portions
• Indexes Allows for quick reference work
• Built-in Study Aids summaries, quizzes, further
  readings

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All Important Format

• With other e-books, consumers are generally most
  concerned with getting the same content as the
  print counterpart.
• With textbooks, the format is just as important.
  Structure is need to create a desirable learning
  experience.

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Print Textbooks Advantages

• No power or internet required
• Physical Interaction
• Bookmarking
• Highlighting
• Making notes
• Flipping back and forth
• Research says print may support a higher quality
  reading experience
• Students often report they do not retain the
  information as easily reading from a screen.

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Print Textbooks disadvantages

• Lengthy publication schedule for textbooks
• Inevitably include outdated information
• Passive medium for transmitting information,
  requires no active role on the part of the
  student
• Limited by their physical form. Large, heavy, no
  multimedia. (OShea, Onderdonk, D. Allen, D.W.
  Allen, 2011)
• Expensive
• Average student spends 1168 on course materials
  this year (collegeboard.com)

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• With the disadvantages to print textbooks,
  publishers have long tried to utilize technology
  to make a better digital version.

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Where are we how did we get here?

• Experimentation 2000-2003
• Textbook publishers created non-PDF,
  non-standard, custom-reader products
• No market and technology could not support them
• Early Markets 2004-2006
• Many publishers returned to PDF format
• Flash became a predominant technology

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Where are we how did we get here?

• Proliferation Integration 2007-2008
• Cost of e-textbook production drops
• Major publishers support multiple formats
  readers
• XML becomes more prominent
• Profitability Social Learning 2009-2011
• For-profit virtual universities (e.g., U of
  Phoenix) drive e-textbooks growth
• Widespread adoption of mobile devices
• E-textbooks begin to offer multimedia features
  and integration within social learning networks.

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Where are we how did we get here?

• Standards Disaggregated Distribution 2012-2014
• Emergence of a common standard textbook XML
• Move from a single book to collection of
  malleable content assets which can be mashed up
  with other digital products
• Greater focus on design for smartphone and tablet
  use
• Open textbooks
• More integration of social features
• (Rob Reynolds, http//blog.xplana.com/2010/09/the-
  five-waves-of-e-textbooks-in-the-u-s-200-2014/)

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E-textbooks The Future

• Must incorporate dynamic and interactive features
• Social reading features (like Subtext or
  Readmill)
• Tools to highlight, take share notes,
  discussion forums
• Embedded links to outside resources, such as
  pre-defined searches in library databases

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E-textbooks The Future

• Fully customizable in content and format without
  publisher constraints
• Integration with online CMS
• E-textbooks will be less like books and more like
  e-learning environments.
• They wont be cheap.
• E-textbooks save many students only 1
  (chronicle.com)

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E-Textbook Options
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Loyolas e-textbooks

• CourseSmart
• Major textbook publishers, including
  Pearson,McGraw-Hill, and John Wiley Sons
  launched CourseSmart in 2007
• More than 20,000 digital titles
• Available from University Bookstore
• Rental options only

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CourseSmart Features

• Offline reading (currently in beta)
• Note taking and highlighting ability
• Search features
• Print 10 pages at a time
• Send information from text to classmates
• App
• Cost
• About half the price of a new hardcover

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Open model

• Aims to bring students free, or inexpensive,
  e-textbooks by using or creating open-access
  educational materials

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Open model

• Washington State Open Course Library
• Funded by Washington state legislation and the
  Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation
• Faculty course designers selected through bid
  process
• Resources for 42 courses
• Students pay no more than 30

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Open model

• University of Massachusetts at Amherst
• Open Education Initiative
• University funded 10 faculty grants
• Created and used freely accessible materials
• Worked closely with Library to integrate
  subscription online sources create hosting
  platform
• Estimated to save 700 students 72,000 in
  2011-2012

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Open model

• Flatworld Knowledge
• Company recruits scholars to build peer-reviewed
  texts
• Creative Commons license allows anyone to edit
  and customize
• Currently 3,000 instructor users
• 55 e-textbooks available

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Vendor level customization

• AcademicPub
• Arranges payment of royalties and compiles
  material for publication
• E-text for 15, print for 27, hardcover for
  45
• 2 million items of content from 75 publishers
• Instructors can pull in any open web content

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Vendor level customization

• McGraw-Hill Higher Education Create
• Allows instructors pick and choose from the
  companys textbooks
• Macmillan Publishers DynamicBooks
• Allows instructors to add freely available
  content to their existing e-titles

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Kno

• Non-customizable
• Rented 6 months, some can be purchased
• Available on web, iPad or Facebook
• Over 100,000 titles
• Cost
• Renting ½ the purchase price
• Purchase Varies, but more expensive than
  hardcover print version

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Kno features

• Journal
• Transfer any highlights, pictures, stickies or
  notes from your textbook into a digital notebook.
• Pen
• Quiz Me
• Turns any diagram in your textbook or PDFs into
  an instant quiz
• Smart Links
• Maps instructional videos, images, and photos to
  formulas concepts in your book includes Khan
  Academy
• Kno 3D
•  Lets you rotate, spin and zoom objects
• Dropbox Integration

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Inkling

• Creates multimedia e-textbooks versions for the
  iPad
• Currently 111 publications new partnerships
  with Pearson and McGraw-Hill will grow
• Engineers and designers work with content and
  education experts to reimagine existing print
  textbooks

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Inkling features

• Less Search
• Search text, glossary, and personal notes
• Test Prep
• Images, audio, video
• Social features
• Follow others using your book see their notes
  highlights, have discussions

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E-books and E-TextbooksPossibilities and
pitfalls of academic digital monographs

• Questions?
• Tara Radniecki
• tradniecki_at_luc.edu
• twitter.com/tradniecki
• Niamh McGuigan
• nmcguigan_at_luc.edu