Advocates for open-license textbooks in higher education, while largely unhappy with Apple’s new iBooks 2 platform, say the technology behemoth has done a favor for their movement: Apple’s pricey, limiting approach to digital textbooks is in stark contrast to the textbook model that aims for low-cost or free college texts.
iBooks 2, announced to great fanfare [1] during a flashy Jan. 19 press conference in New York City, offers iBooks Author [2] software that enables instructors and others to create and publish their own interactive digital textbooks in the Apple iBooks Bookstore.
Some campus technology leaders hailed the new iBooks platform as a revolution in digital publishing.
Others took a close look at the iBooks 2 licensing agreement’s fine print and called it “crazy evil,” [3] “mind-bogglingly greedy,” [4] and “deliberate sabotage” [5]of the open, industry-leading standard known as EPUB [6].