Chronicle of Education discusses Kindle
By Steve Jordan
The education realm’s highly respected The Chronicle of Higher Education has posted an article considering the new Kindle’s possible future role in the classroom, amid discussions and rumors of e-textbooks just around the corner.
Most experts interviewed by The Chronicle expressed skepticism that students would buy and carry around a Kindle for textbooks, even if the device was bigger and had better annotating and Web-browsing capabilities than Amazon’s current e-book reader. But the new gadget might do something that all of the current providers of e-textbooks have failed to do—make digital textbooks seem cool.
The article goes on to discuss the other device most students already have that can read e-texts: Their laptops. And the fact that despite this, e-texts have been slow to catch on in areas where they have already been available. The report cites a service called CourseSmart that offered e-texts, that is apparently all but unknown to students and faculty alike.
The article suggests that e-books may be due for a rebranding after years of lackluster performance and sales. But perhaps most interesting (from their point of view) is this:
Publishers are eager to go digital in hopes of eliminating the used-book market, as buyers are prohibited from reselling electronic books, argues Albert N. Greco. a professor of marketing at Fordham University’s Graduate School of Business who studies the textbook industry. That market represents “a staggering amount of business that the publishers lose,” he said, “so by going to digital they’ll be able to regain what they lose in used books.”
May 8th, 2009 at 9:34 am
Assuming the textbook publisher get the pricing right, this could be a huge win-win-win for publishers, authors, and students (but not so much for university bookstores). eTextbooks could be priced at less than the net price of a paper textbook less its resale value. eTextbooks wouldn’t have to be updated with artificial editions designed only to spike the used textbook market (at a current huge cost to publishers) and authors could reap royalties based on all of their books sold rather than simply first sale. One semester’s savings could pay for a Kindle DX for the student. If, on the other hand, publishers attempt to price eTexts at the same level as paper texts, I can’t see any fast movement.
Rob Preece
May 8th, 2009 at 9:59 am
Agreed. And I wouldn’t sweat the university “bookstores” too much… they can make up the lost sales on branded T-shirts, shorts, shot-glasses, pens, pennants, stuffed mascots, hats, backpacks, purses, keyrings, staplers, toolkits, beer can holders…