Video source

I followed with great interest Apple’s education-related announcements on iBook textbooks for the iPad, the free iBooks Author (video above) and the new version of iTunes U.

To catch up on the news, I recommend:

• LifeHacker (for a concise version)
• Edudemic (for a more detailed, curated version)

I also read some reactions at Edudemic’s tweet collection and RRW’s Why Apple, Why Does it Have to Be Like This? The Cold Cynicism of the iBook EULA.

The author of the RRW article had an issue with the iBook end user license agreement:

It’s hard to wrap my brain around the cold cynicism of Apple’s releasing a new tool to democratize the publishing of eBooks today, only to include in the tool’s terms and conditions a prohibition against selling those books anywhere but through Apple’s own bookstore.

But look again. That same article highlighted that “if your Work is provided for free (at no charge), you may distribute the Work by any available means”.

So the complaint is not entirely valid. Apple has a right to make money out of its publishing platform. But we as creators also retain the right to publish freely on any platform.

As a creator of content you have a choice, which is better than having none at all. You also have a choice of making some of the content free and charging for the rest (like “lite” and full versions of apps).

But ultimately, the opportunity to publish more professional looking documents for free is the value-add to the game that is already changing. I do not think that Apple’s move is a game changer.

We have already created content on other platforms before iBooks 2. Now we can do it in a slick way that has a publishing, distribution and selling platform, iPad readers for consuming, and a ready market.

Schools can curate, create and distribute their own textbooks. Learners can be authors or co-authors. Teachers can rethink the way they teach. This is freeing in more ways than one: Freeing yourself from traditional publishing costs and also from outdated ways of educating learners.

That said, the “new” iBook ecosystem does not go as far as I had hoped. It is a level 1 e-book in my books. The dominant creatures in the ecosystem are flash cards, multiple choice questions and highlighters. Those features are dinosaurs compared to the emerging mammals like shared annotations and social interaction with authors, experts, teachers and peers.

Then again, this may just be the start of Apple’s e-book evolution.