Content area
Full Text
Apple's build-your-own-book tool is likely to lead to more fragmentation in the market rather than becoming a dominant new model.
Apple made a splashy entrance into the digital-textbook market on Thursday at an event here at the Guggenheim Museum, but its new build-your-own-textbook tool is likely to lead to more fragmentation in the market rather than becoming a dominant new model.
During an hourlong presentation, officials from the tech company known for shaking up music and other industries used sweeping language to describe the changes they believed their new products would bring. The company is "reinventing the textbook," said Philip Schiller, a senior vice president, and "as students are introduced to iPad, remarkable things are happening." Apple's leaders identified high schools as the biggest initial market for its new books, though they mentioned potential in higher education as well.
The most unusual offering was iBooks Author, a free book-making program that lets anyone build a rich-media textbook that can be displayed easily on an iPad. Professors can drag in...