From a Publisher’s perspective Apple’s iPad textbook initiative is a decent 1.0 release with promise. I’ve had a few weeks to play with iBooks Author and iBooks2 and discuss them with colleagues. I’ll write about the many positives in future posts. But there is a worm in this apple. All…
Education publishers and Learning Management Systems have a long and somewhat checkered history. Open source publishing, XML, and content digitization are changing the LMS landscape rapidly. In today’s guest post Louise Dube outlines the issues facing companies creating instructional materials. By Louise Dube What to do? Educator Buying Trends, a…
Today’s walkabout focuses on a fundamental shift in the instructional materials industry away from the scale economics of the big textbook publishers to the value of niche focused expertise. I believe this is the future of our business. In a world where Home Depot crushes the local hardware store only…
In a conversation with Randy Pennington he pointed out that in my post textbooks vs. education technology – clash of paradigms I alluded to the financial paradigms but didn’t address them directly. Theres more… Textbook Publishers – Their financial model depends on winning large adoption contracts that yeild a high…
The worlds of textbook publishers and education technology companies are colliding. The market is driving this convergence – schools have had technology around long enough that they have figured out how it can integrate in with existing practices. Yet the list of successful educational products that blend print and technology…