Apple and books

Today’s Apple announcement (one summary) has given me a lot to consider. Cindy and I have a book and have split with our publisher over a new approach we have been developing. Unfortunately, our intention is not a perfect match for the Apple opportunity (we wanted to downsize and downprice the print product and commit more strongly to web content). There are logical arguments for what should go where. The upside for us is we have a product even if it now exists in a very different format. There are other problems. I am far better at stringing words together than the artistic bent Apple showcases so well. The Apple examples are big buck products produced by teams of talented and well paid people. There will have to be lots of $15 sales to pay the cost. Maybe this will work out – for a few – and maybe it won’t. Too much competition at this level of “quality” (or glitz) and there will be many losers who spent lots of money to sell a $15 product to not enough people. This will sell a lot of iPads. You can see who is taking the risk here.

I like this analysis from Paul Carr on what this may mean. He claims the companies will be fine. Self-publishing is not as easy as it may sound. Explaining how to do things is easy – here is how you use Flickr , here is how you use Google docs. Giving examples of how students might use these tools is also easy. It is the analysis of whether any of this is a good idea, at least an analysis rooted in educational research, that is difficult. What Carr suggests is that it is the work involved in providing this broad perspective that is overlooked. A manual is a summer project. A well researched book takes a year or so. [I provided this time frame based on personal experience]

There will be both books and manuals so authors will do fine. The individuals I see this leaving out are the sales people, the book reps, etc. Apple will likely give a free account or more to each school. Pretty safe – administrators, department heads, etc. – will be able to look at any book they want.  No need to send sales people to the school. No worry even that the educators will sell what they examine and reject on the used market. There is no used app market. I do have personal concern. Book companies will probably have no reason to spend big money on the conventions educators attend either. Without the subsidy those of us who attend will be asked to pay more to pay the invited speakers and rent the facilities. I guess we can stay home and look at our iPads.

Now, I am waiting for others to respond. Apple has taken a similar approach here as it did with music – get the major labels (companies) first. Will other companies come in with a different strategy of some type. Amazon seems to have its own approach to music and a large stake on books. What about textbooks? What about textbooks on a “free” Kindle Fire? One counter strategy may be the price of the device. We could give the devices to schools if the devices are tied to our content.

And then, there is Google. What is the alternative to the “protected app” approach? How much of the experience is about social. Interactivity as in “click a video” or “highlight” is pretty low end. What about sharing your highlights, finding which content is highlighted most frequently (a kind of wisdom of the highlighting crowd), connect your highlights with content that is not under the control of the book publisher. Who might be able to determine such connections on the fly? What about an environment in which you can interact with real people? Open environments work better for participation.

P.S. – If you are interested in publishing in this fashion, here are some issues you may not have realized provided by MacWorld.