eBook And Publishing News . . .And Spring Fever

Most days I sit down to write this blog and the biggest problem I have is narrowing it down to just one or two topics.  This week, for some unknown reason, I haven't been able to find anything interesting enough to write about.

I seem to be in some sort of spring fever state which makes it impossible to focus on any of the list of possible topics:

• The London Book Fair and the IBS questionnaire on eBooks
• The rumored $100 Android based netbook/eTablet
• The IDPF February eBook Sales report
• Random House's enhanced eBooks which might have been the one except that the link to any meaningful info is broken
• The Pulitzer Prizes
• The Wall Street Journal story on eTextBook rentals
• The Wall Street Journal story on eBooks

Not one of them really caught fire with me this week; but PLEASE check them out for yourself.  There is some really interesting stuff going on I'm just too fevered to fix on anything!

del.icio.us Tags: ebook,e-book,ebook news,ebook sales,digital reading,ebook technology,enhanced ebooks,eTextbooks

Smartphones in the Classroom

This morning, the New York Times has a great piece on smartphones in the classroom.

One one side is the cellphone industry saying that using a smartphone improves math skills. The claim is based on a study conducted in four North Carolina schools. The schools were all located in low-income neighborhoods; and 9th and 10th-grade math students were given high-end cellphones. The phone were each preloaded with special algebra learning programs.

The students used the phones to study -- recording them solving problems and even posting videos of their work for other students to watch. Evidently the school had set up a private network just for these students. Now how cool is that!

But there's more. . . the students were allowed talk and texting minutes to use during their off time. And just to keep things safe, the messages were monitored by teachers to make sure that they were appropriate.

At the end of the year the students were given an algebra exam and the results showed that students with the phones performed 25 percent better than those without the devices.

Of course, there is the other side. This side includes the usual suspects, teacher unions such as the American Federation of Teachers, school administrators and some individual teachers who believe that cellphones are just a distraction from the real business of learning. Which explains why many states and school districts ban cellphones on school campuses.

I would be willing to bet that most of these detractors have never even used a smart phone. . .

After watching the teens around me, I have to say that giving them a cellphone sounds like a winner idea. They are smaller and cheaper than computers; they can be insured for very little money and the kids love them.

Most of the teens I know remind me Charleton Heston -- you will have to pry the cell phone out of their cold dead hands. It seems to me a winning strategy to use their passion for the devices and leverage it into an educational tool.

The cost of a smartphone, especially when bought in bulk, can't be much more expensive than the outrageous amount of money spent on textbooks and supplies.

From what I have seen in our local school system there is a lot of room for experimentation. When you have one third of the children in the district "left behind", the status quo is clearly NOT working.

del.icio.us Tags: ebooks,e-books,cellphones in the classroom,education

eBooks and Publishing News 2/21/08

First a correction!

I got email from Jenny Murphy at Guerilla PR. She wrote:

Thanks for writing about the “Plant a Tree” drive. I just wanted to take a moment to clarify the purpose of the $5 gift certificate to iChapters.com. Our intention was to give you an opportunity to try out the site for yourself, before representing it to your readers. I’m sorry if that was unclear.

So, looks like I misunderstood and I stand corrected; they weren't trying to bribe me after all and I shouldn't have crumbed on them. My apologies to iChapter and Guerilla PR.

Keep up the good work!

Fairfield Research Make eBook Predictions

Publishers Weekly is reporting on a research report that estimates that somewhere between 6.8 and 16 million adults will download a digital book in the next few (?) years. I consider this WONDERFUL news!

The report also finds that 17% of current book buyers say that would seriously consider purchasing a digital book. 55% of books buyers are planning to stick to paper, thank you very much; but there are 27% who are "ambivalent"; they just might be persuaded.

The finding that fascinates me the most, however, is their of the profile of the most likely buyers: employed males ages 25–34 with income over $100,000.

I emailed fairfield@navix.net for an executive summary and am anxiously awaiting it.

Heads Up -- It's almost here!

Read an eBook week is almost here. This particular week's celebration was created by Rita Toews. For some amazing facts about eBooks and pBooks visit her site -- www.domokos.com/readebookweek.html. Mark your calendar for March 9-15.

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Electronic Reading vs Print Reading

The National Endowment for the Arts has concluded a three year study on reading trends in the US. The study, entitled To Read or Not to Read was released earlier this month.

The reports concludes that

• voluntary reading rates are dropping
• reading skills are "worsening" among teens
• adults are becoming less proficient readers

Pretty grim news for people like me who's life is all about books and reading.

It was with some trepidation that I downloaded the 98 very dry, dull pages and began to read them. Just as I was beginning to nod off I came across this little gem:

Opinions aside, there is a shortage of scientific research on the effects of screen reading—not only on long-term patterns of news consumption, but more importantly, on the development of young minds and young readers. (A good research question is whether the hyperlinks, pop-up windows, and other extra-textual features of screen reading can sharpen a child’s ability to perform sustained reading, or whether they impose unhelpful distractions.) (To Read or Not to Read p53)

That woke me up. I decided I didn't need to torture myself anymore and deleted the report from my machine.

There is an assumption here that I violently disagree with -- the only reading worth studying or reporting on is a printed page in a book.

So not true!

My email, RSS feeds and blogs provide me with more reading material in one day than I used to get in an entire month.

I could tell that this is all work related and not in any sense voluntary. I would be lying.

Everyday, I follow links that take me to very strange places. Who hasn't had the experience of becoming intrigued with some weird factoid and going off on a reading tangent totally unrelated to anything! In my particular case if someone sends me a Facebook link it is very possible that an hour later I am making new friends - after reading all about them. I don't even want to discuss YouTube!

Are they unhelpful distractions? Who knows for sure. What we do know (from experience) is that those distractions very often keep us doing sustained reading. AND we are in fact reading things we probably never would have had access to or read any other way. Say what you will, it is still reading. And it is not exactly unpopular.

Look around any Starbucks and count the number of people typing on laptops, PDAs and cellphones. Count those reading newspapers. If they are not reading, what exactly are they doing?

The NEA is alarmed and gloomy about reading in America. I am not. Call me a crazy optimist; but the evidence of my own eyes suggests that reading is alive and well and maybe even on the upstroke.

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