Electronic Textbooks – Better for Students And Better For The Environment
The academic publishing world is, quite possibly, not the first thing that most people would think of when considering innovative technology. Nevertheless, it is this, very traditional, area which seems to be championing huge changes in the way that books are read.
The launch of the original Kindle took place in November 2007. The academic community didn’t really get too excited about it at the time. When the upgraded Kindle 2 was released in February 2009, there was a little more interest, but still not really that much.
It was only with the announcement of Amazon’s Kindle DX that it became clear that our reading habits were about to be subject to major modification. The large screen of the DX, coupled with its native pdf file handling ability, made it ideal for academic textbooks containing large quantities of graphs and pictures.
Educational establishments quickly cottoned on to the fact that they could save money by using digital textbooks and e-book readers. Without the cost of paper or ink, and with none of the distribution fees which would normally be required for a physical product, e-books are a much cheaper alternative to a conventional paper book. Considerable financial savings could be made by schools, colleges and universities by making the switch to electronic textbooks.
Additionally, the electronic storage format allows for easy updates and revisions. There is currently an average gap of seven years between revisions of traditional textbooks. Making the change to electronic textbooks will facilitate more frequent revisions and ensure that course books are current and up to date.
A further benefit, which is certainly of interest to many academic institutions, is the environmental profile of e-book readers and e-books. Even offsetting the materials used in the production of the readers and also the electricity required to power them, they are considerably more environmentally friendly than the paper based equivalent.
Whatever way you choose to look at it, the introduction of electronic textbooks makes perfect sense. They are already in use in many educational establishments and, when you look at all the potential benefits outlined above, it seems highly likely that their usage can be expected to increase rapidly in the near future.
Learn more about Amazon’s Kindle reader – including how to save money by downloading free Kindle ebooks.
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