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Kindle found to be worse than paper textbooks

npr.org

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Re: Kindle found to be worse than paper textbooks

#11

Post by ugh »

Loic wrote: post #2

Very short summary: - with the iPad you can do interactive books which are basically the new "interactive CDROM" you had some years ago. - with the Kindle you cannot easily flip through the pages and write notes on them, this is why it does not improve the traditional textbook. Nothing new, you know that after 15 minutes using the devices. But I must say, to read novels, news and stuff like that, you cannot really be…

… basically the new "interactive CDROM" …

I don’t think that’s a fair description. Why were interactive CDs so horrible? Well, you needed this huge clunky machine (the wall of screens between teacher and students) which takes ages to start, you need to find the damn CD and you need to wait forever until the program is loaded. Oh, and that whole interaction thing with the mouse was very clunky. [+]

The new tablets are small, lightweight, you don’t have to boot them up and apps load practically instantly.

I wouldn’t be too dismissive of them. They are a far cry from the old experience. It still might not work but I don’t think it’s enough to say “Oh, just like the old CD-ROMs!” and leave it at that.

[+] To be fair, I think that horribly production values had also something to do with it. That’s something new devices can’t remedy but I think we are a lot more experienced and have better tools today. The technology and our knowledge is more mature.

Re: Kindle found to be worse than paper textbooks

#13

Post by gamble »

markbao wrote: post #10
gamble wrote: post #8

The academic publishers are in for a swift attitude adjustment when the average student realizes that scanned copies of almost any undergrad textbook can be found online. It seems strange to me that so many 18-22 y/o's won't pay $0.99 for a song, yet they're still paying $200 for a textbook.

I wouldn't say so. Pirating textbooks is much harder than pirating music. The entry point is $0.99 for pirating music; it is $150+ plus scanning (or somehow obtaining a PDF version of the textbook) for textbooks.

In my experience, every textbook an undergrad is likely to use is already available on a file sharing site or torrent.

Re: Kindle found to be worse than paper textbooks

#15

Post by Loic »

ugh wrote: post #11
Loic wrote: post #2

Very short summary: - with the iPad you can do interactive books which are basically the new "interactive CDROM" you had some years ago. - with the Kindle you cannot easily flip through the pages and write notes on them, this is why it does not improve the traditional textbook. Nothing new, you know that after 15 minutes using the devices. But I must say, to read novels, news and stuff like that, you cannot really be…

… basically the new "interactive CDROM" … I don’t think that’s a fair description. Why were interactive CDs so horrible? Well, you needed this huge clunky machine (the wall of screens between teacher and students) which takes ages to start, you need to find the damn CD and you need to wait forever until the program is loaded. Oh, and that whole interaction thing with the mouse was very clunky. [+] The new tablets are…

I am not dismissive, but writing scientific publications is really a hard work. Really hard work, even in black and white with just a few illustrations and tables.

So, I do think that we will be able to get wonderful tablet based text books, but it will be for main stream topics (most likely all the undergraduate stuff, like the Feynman books in physics) and not cutting edge.

This is why I put them at the "interactive CDROM" level, in the sense that it will be available for topics which were covered with these CDROM.

On a side note, I really hope people will produce a lot of good content for the tablets and make the content available for not a lot of money. The more we get people to know what is science, what we do as scientists, how we try to reason on problems and argue with data and theories based on data, the better the world will be.

Re: Kindle found to be worse than paper textbooks

#16

Post by rbranson »

Maybe if the publishers will stop being greedy and start selling these things for a reasonable price, they'd catch on like wildfire. The digital versions are currently nearly as expensive as the printed version -- basically it seems like they're charging the full price of the book minus the printing cost. The problem is, the dead tree versions can be re-sold when you're done, but the digital versions cannot, which makes them MUCH more expensive.

Re: Kindle found to be worse than paper textbooks

#17

Post by angstrom »

mattgratt wrote: post #5

Is there any evidence cited here beyond opinion? Or, strangely, does Steve Jobs' alma mater prefer a more expensive and colorful device? I think this is a difference horses for different courses. If you study English or Political Science (like I did), you'll probably find a Kindle easier to deal with. If you study biology, chemistry, or topics like that, the animations and rendering of diagrams on an iPad will be sup…

Also, do digital books kill open book quizzes?

Re: Kindle found to be worse than paper textbooks

#18

Post by sprout »

Media, be they iPads or Kindles or paper, are not nearly so important as content. For the average student, I doubt that either the Kindle or the iPad can add any content that will offset the cost of the device.

The cash-strapped college student would be best served by a cheap netbook, or if the student insists on a variety of media appliances, perhaps a laptop with a large screen. That should be adequate for any sort of interactive content, and a plethora of free content.

And of course, the student will require a healthy amount of discipline. Both the iPad and the Kindle make great publicity stunts, but neither is going to make a significant difference in a student's ability to learn.

There are a variety of interactive demoes that do help, but personally I think people should be making those demoes available in cross-platform form, or on some Linux/BSD variant so any cheap computer can be repurposed to run the software. If you convince yourself that the iPad or the Kindle or the Courier is the best device for education, I doubt you really have any insight to offer on education.

Every device has strengths and weaknesses. I'd say the best devices to allow skilled educators to create novel educational software are those that place the least restrictions on the educator. That's neither the iPad or the Kindle.

Re: Kindle found to be worse than paper textbooks

#19

Post by confusedcitizen »

Maybe I'm being a prude, or maybe it's just inertia, but does everyone have an easy time replacing a textbook with an electronic device? An argument can probably be made about how ever-advancing technology might make note-taking (and the like) easier, but I often have a hard time detaching myself from the (very) personal experience a book ends up being. I don't just mean the contents of it, but also the feel of having a book in your hand and it being a companion. So much so, that there are times when reflecting back to certain textbooks, I'm reminded of the how the book 'looked' and 'felt'. Almost like how face-to-face conversation differs from over-the-wire.

Do most people feel otherwise?

Re: Kindle found to be worse than paper textbooks

#20

Post by gcheong »

It's interesting they chose to interview a professor from Reed given that the CEO of Apple dropped out of Reed and Reed has always been rather Apple centric when it comes to computing platforms for students ( http://www.reed.edu/cis/about/computing_faq.html#typesused). It would have been interesting to see if the opinions given here were shared with other institutions that are participating in the iPad/Kindle trials.

I can't say for sure, but this article seems awfully close to this:

http://www.paulgraham.com/submarine.html

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