There is a rumour that an imminent Apple event is going to concentrate on two large educational projects, a subject area that was close to the heart for Apple’s co-founder, Steve Jobs.

Insiders and those ‘in the know’ are reporting a strong possibility that one of these projects is based around the iTunes and iBook stores storing and providing digital textbooks, eBooks, or eTextbooks.

“MacRumors reported that Apple has filmed promotional interviews with executives from the textbook publishing industry, possibly affirming that this upcoming event will focus on digital textbooks. They noted that while these interviews have indeed been worked on, there is no confirmation that they relate to this upcoming event.”

The other big project is rumoured, by Goodreader, to put Apple in direct competition with Amazon (again) by making it easier for self-published work to be made available through the iBook store. It is recognised that content that Amazon and B&N provide with the Kindle and Nook devices make these devices enough of a threat to Apple to mean this attempt from Apple could be a way to redress the balance? Expect a handsome percentage from any book sale to go to Apple before you, the author, gets a look in though.

So, here’s your chance to say what you’d pay, or expect to pay, for a digital edition of the paper-copy. Bearing in mind the costs involved in getting a paper-copy to of a (e.g.) $30.00 textbook to the shop (based on the figures in the Guardian: ‘The true price of publishing‘) are in the region of 10% ($3.00) to print and distribute the book, how much of the remaining 90% is for the author, editor, reviewer, etc?

The poll will run until February 1st, 2012.

Image source: Elio Rojano

Update: January 11th – Several websites (including Mashable) are reporting the official news that the event will be held at the Guggenheim Museum in New York on January 19th … only 1 week away. I’m sure Twitter and the tech websites will all be following it (they follow anything Apple avidly!), and so will I.

Related posts:

1. Reading “The iPad for Academics”
2. Poll – “Where do you host your academic / training videos?”
3. iPad – more resources on whether it is any good in the classroom

I really ought to find somewhere else to publish all these posts and ideas on eBooks, but considering I think they are a ‘considerable’ part of the future of eLearning then they’ll stay here for the moment.

This infographic is, like most are, based on facts and figures from the US but still holds some interesting numbers, if you look for them:

• 7% shift towards using an eReader between 2010 and 2011.
• 1 in 6 will use or buy an eReader in the next 6 months (that’s an estimated 53 million Units for an estimated 312 million Americans).

Source: LiveScience (click to view)

Related posts:

1. eBooks and Textbooks of the future #eBook #Infographic
2. Interactive eBooks are one-step closer to reality #eBook #KindleFire
3. Infographic: The Tablets are taking over? #Infographic

eBooks are something I am really keen on becoming involved in (I have a few ideas, but no time!) which is why I was really really REALLY happy when I read this latest article on the Amazon website: “Announcing HTML5 Support in Kindle Format 8“.

“We’re pleased to announce a wide range of new features and enhancements – including HTML5 support – coming in Kindle Format 8 (KF8). As showcased on Kindle Fire, KF8 enables publishers to create great-looking books in categories that require rich formatting and design such as children’s picture books, comics & graphic novels, technical & engineering books and cookbooks. Kindle Format 8 replaces the Mobi format and adds over 150 new formatting capabilities, including fixed layouts, nested tables, callouts, sidebars and Scalable Vector Graphics, opening up more opportunities to create Kindle books that readers will love.”

This is bringing the eBook format closer and closer to the type of books that you can only download and access as Apps on certain tablets.

The big question for me is how well these new format eBooks will degrade for those buying and viewing on older and/or non-HTML5 supported devices? If, as I hope from reading the FAQs on the above link, they will degrade well, and eInk devices will be able to suppport some elements of the HTML5 edition.

Now then, where are those extra hours I need each day … ? Oh, and anyone know a good resource to learn the finer and more interesting points of HTML5 and CSS3 please?

Here are some links I have found interesting/engaging when reading around this topic:

• An Open Source, HTML5 Framework for iPad E-books
• Treesaver® is a JavaScript framework for creating magazine-style layouts using standards-compliant HTML and CSS

No related posts.

As some of you will know I am a firm believer of eBooks and their place in future of learning and learning materials, as well as popular fiction. This is why I though I would post the link to this Infographic on eBooks and textbooks of tomorrow:

[Click to enlarge]

Via: OnlineEducation.net

Interesting facts that the graphic contains:

• Digital textbooks are (on average) 53% cheaper than traditionally printed versions
• Don’t invest in whiz-bang highlighter pens, invest in a tablet and use your finger to highlight instead
• Included video and graphics bring the subject to the fore and in an interactive and engaging manner
• New media will complement rather than distract from the original textbook message (depending on the author’s use of the media surely?)

What is your view of eBooks and their place in academia? Please leave a comment below and share your views.

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I’ve just taken part in a webinar from the LSG (Learning & Skills Group) on “QR Codes, Mobile Tagging and Learning”, delivered by Paul Simbeck-Hampson (@simbeckhampson). Those of you familiar with my blog and work will know I’m a huge fan of QR Codes and how we can (should) be using them in and around campus, libraries, books, materials, presentations, videos, tours, etc. If you’re not familiar then here are a few links to ‘key’ posts from the last year:

• Resource page on QR Codes
• QR Codes: The nuts and bolts
• QR Codes: In the Classroom
• QR Codes: Learning Technology

The webinar was advertised as a discovery about:

• What QR codes are and how they differ from normal barcodes,
• How QR Codes are being used to support learning & improve performance,
• What design elements you need to consider within a QR code strategy,
• What tools you’ll need for creating, reading, and measuring QR codes,
• How the future of mobile tagging is already part of the present.

It was also followed on Twitter using the #LSGWebinar hashtag.

Now I’ll freely admit that I may not have needed to hear the early par of the webinar and associated chat as I think I already know enough about the codes, what they are and how to use them, but I think it’s always worth being around for it just in case I find out something I did not know.

It is the last element of the webinar that most interested me – “How the future of mobile tagging is already part of the present”. If you read through the links above to previous posts of mine you will see some examples of how I think we could use them, so this element will either affirm my ideas or give em some new ones. I hoped I’d find some new ideas from Paul and the audience.

Here are some notes I made during the webinar. Any images below are the destination Paul sent us to when he showed a QR Code in the presentation – click them to enlarge.

How would you use the codes in your organisation?

• hard copies linking to online copies
• code on book cover linking to eBook edition
• give expanded explanations of objects
• access to training notes
• access to information re training events, times/places etc
• small taster sessions
• provide info for students on local businesses
• attendance monitoring – everyone is tattooed with a QR code, you scan them when they come into training

How are they used to support learning & development?

• Location: maps & directions for meeting, training, etc

• Chunks: video training, etc

• Convenience: memorable, fun, etc

What Design Elements?

“Code is like handshake, if they take your hand you own them something” Eric Weymueller

• Link to mobile ready website
• Code type:
• Content: check content linking to be ensure those on limited data tariffs can view
• Navigation: simplicity wins
• Platforms: touch and non-touch screens alike

Good destination link, mobile-ready

Not so good destination link: 14 minute video (not good if user is on limited data plan)

Bad design (on any platform) and not to be used on mobile(?)

Future of mobile tagging is part of present?

“… trigger to metaphorical loaded gun, bullets being the content” Nick Ford

• QR – printed media, web-to-mobile downloads, triggers, etc
• RFID – radio frequency ID tag (security tags)
• NFC – near-field communication (mPayments, point of purchase, etc) pay with your phone
• AR – Augmented Reality, location, gamification, etc

Thanks to Paul and Don for the webinar, send an email to Paul on paul@simbeckhampson.com with “LSGWebinar” in the subject to receive his 22 page report on QR Codes.

Tweet from QR Code, but I needed to login to web Twitter, not iPhone app (if that can be done?)

If you missed the webinar you can watch the recording through the Learning and Skills Group on Ning, when it is uploaded.

Reflection
The webinar was good and well attended and presented, the engagement with the audience (code scanning) was very useful and highlighted the difficulty with using this technology – even though the webinar advertised that we would be scanning codes there were a number of individuals in the audience who did not have the technology to do so. While the codes were displayed with shortened URLs these were not explained for some time until someone highlighted them in the ‘chat’ area.

The explanation of the codes, how they are used, and how they might be used was good and reaffirmed my understanding that how I have thought of using them is along the same lines as others. the real value was the Q&A section at the end when the more detailed information surfaced; e.g. scanning and readability of the codes, the ‘optimum’ size for a code, code readers for different devices (Google Goggles sounds good), and the fact that you can modify the codes and input some design (see this for an example – “Make your Code Beautiful“).

Were you on the webinar? Did you like it? Did you learn anything from it? Please drop a comment about how you use QR Codes, or how you are going to start using them.

No related posts.

You probably know how keen I am on QR Codes, and how good useful I think they could be in a library environment (place the code on a shelf or book cover to indicate, and link to, the eBook version, that kind of thing).

However, I came across this little idea that brings together the scanning properties of smart phones (iPhone, Blackberry, Android phones, etc) and an online database of book titles and publisher details. Bring them together and you get the ability to produce a fully formatted reference for your academic piece of work.

Do you get it?

The idea is not new (it is to me, but not to these guys from the University of Waterloo) and this post “Smartphone App Makes Book Citations a Snap” goes some way to what I was thinking. The above project has it’s downsides, namely;

• It only produces a fully formatted reference / citation for a limited reference style (at Bournemouth and a fair few other UK HEIs we use the Harvard style to format references)
• It does not produce, as advertised, a fully-formatted citation, but a slightly concatenated version (“Cambridge Univ Pr” instead of “Cambridge University Press”)
• It relies on books having a barcode. Not all books are young enough to have a barcode so students using that still rely and use older books (medicine, law, etc) will suffer here

If you could link this together with online sources like Amazon, Google Books, the (huge list of) publishers and journals, and get the citation/reference exact each and every time then this could indeed be quite a powerful little tool.

Oh, and you’d need an app that would have an edition for phones on the many different platforms to be truly useful. Just look around your campus and you’ll see a plethora or iPhones, Blackberrys and phones running Android OS.

Many thanks to Brian Knotts (@BrianKnotss) for this story.

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I’ve been wading through the 2011 Horizon Report and find it fascinating reading and quite a thrill to realise that some of my thoughts are not too far off the mark with what other people /organisations are thinking, saying, or planning.

Here are few passages that caught my attention – mind you most of the report did this too!

“As the electronic book moves further from a digital reproduction of a printed piece, some writers are seeing it become something far richer, allowing journeys through worlds real and imagined, undertaken not alone but in company with other readers. The gestural interfaces of new electronic devices enhance the intellectual experience of reading with tactile interactions. Electronic books have the potential to transform the way we interact with reading material of all kinds, from popular titles to scholarly works”

This is something I have touched on in a previous post on January 17th, 2011 “The Future of eBooks … my vision“, and the video below is referred to in the report after the passage above;

The Future of the Book. from IDEO on Vimeo.

“Despite their obvious advantages of size and weight, electronic books are not as established among scholarly readers as they are among the general public. Several obstacles have stood in the way of general adoption among academic institutions: scarcity of academic titles, lack of necessary features in electronic readers to support scholarly work, a restrictive publishing model, and digital rights management (DRM) issues Despite their obvious advantages of size and weight, electronic books are not as established among scholarly readers as they are among the general public. Several obstacles have stood in the way of general adoption among academic institutions: scarcity of academic titles, lack of necessary features in electronic readers to support scholarly work, a restrictive publishing model, and digital rights management (DRM) issues”

“Until electronic textbooks are divorced from reader-dependent formats, broad adoption will continue to be problematic for universities. Nonetheless, the promise offered by the technology is such that electronic books are being explored in virtually every discipline.  Clear advantages for students (e.g., price and portability) are other factors that make this technology worth pursuing.”

“Mobile applications add easy social interaction around electronic books that could be marshaled in support of group study and focused teacher-student interaction at any point in the text. Electronic texts can be linked to a myriad of supporting materials that can extend and enrich them.”

I am still reading my way through the list of resources and links in the report, but there are some good ones there.

No related posts.

I’ve had some amazing discussions with some colleagues recently about QR Codes and how we can use them. When I got over the initial “huh?” response as to what they are, and they understood that the code can contain type of data, we started to get somewhere really quite quickly.

So, this post is really to consolidate my previous posts and to make it slightly more graphical – images are often easier to follow.

What is a QR Code?
In my first post about the codes -  – I quoted this definition of a QR Code:

“A QR Code is a matrix code (or two-dimensional bar code) created by Japanese corporation Denso-Wave in 1994.” Source: Wikipedia

Let’s face it, that doesn’t mean much to the average person. I explain it to people by explaining how it has already been used: Pepsi used them on bottles to give access to special games and competitions not available anywhere else on the web; they were used to advertise the release of the DVD for ’28 Weeks Later‘ film; and Calvin Klein used them to entice you to see their advert, “uncensored”.

There are plenty of links around (if you search) talking about how US realtors (estate agents to us UK folks) are using them on for-sale boards – instead of having to phone the agents when you see a property you like as you drive around, you simply scan the code on the for-sale board and get the low-down, price, photos, details, etc there and then. Marketing companies are seeing the potential, now it’s time for education to join them.

So;

• You see/find the code,
• You scan the code,
• Your phone decodes the code, and
• Your phone displays the text, link, e

Like this …

What kind of information can you contain/embed in the QR Code?
When you create the QR Code you will have to assign something for it to hold, to contain, to embed. This is text, always text, but what the text is is up to you. it could be;

• Plain text (“Hello”, “My name is … “, etc)
• Your phone number
• Your contact details (name, email address, phone number, address, etc)
• SMS / text details (including your number and a short message)
• URL / web address

The method the user will use to open and decode this information will decide on how this information is used. If you stick to the above then it is highly likely that all QR Code Readers on the different platforms will know what to do.

• Plain text – display text on screen
• Phone number – ask if you want to dial the number
• Contact details – display and/or store the details to your phone memory
• SMS – create the text message and prepare for you to send it
• URL – display and/or open the specified web address

All very powerful stuff.

Where can I generate the code?
There are many good and reliable places/websites you can go to generate your own code (for free), and here are a few I have tried and continue to use:

• Kaywa - qrcode.kaywa.com/
  The first one I found and still one of the best
• Create QR Code - createqrcode.appspot.com/
  Another good one I’ve reported on before, although not as many options
• Mobile Barcodes - www.mobile-barcodes.com/
  Options to create a vCard, email, SMS, etc, and different sizes of QR Codes
• Snap.Vu – www.snap.vu/
  This is good generator website as it has a basic (very basic) stats package behind each generated code, and puts a shortened URL in the actual image to help direct users who are unable to scan the code to the same content (see below). The image you download is good enough for print, so should be ready for all uses you can think of. The shortened URL refers to your code on Snap.vu so accesses/scans are monitored.

In my post QR Codes: In the Classroom I gave some examples of different content (link, text, etc) that had been coded to the QR Code and the different size and quality of the resulting code. It is imperative you take note of this as there is very little ‘loss’ of quality that is accepted by camera and applications before it cannot be decoded – use shortened URL websites (like bit.ly or is.gd) to create short, concise links to make good quality (and easier-to-read) codes.

Whenever you post a QR Code it is essential, in my mind, that you also put a textual element to it – if you’ve not used them before you might need to explain what they are. if nothing else you put a shortened URL along with the code on the page so people without the ability to read the code can still participate. This is why I like Snap.vu – it adds the short URL to the image.

What use are they in ‘education’?

So far the examples above are showing how they can be used in marketing and sales … but what of education? Can they be used? Well, of course they can, and we are only limited by our imagination and abilities in getting all the little bits of the process set-up and working together. By this I mean there is no point in using them around campus (a campus tour / adventure game, for example) if the Estates Group will remove them thinking they’re graffiti.

I listed a few ideas for uses in the classroom or educational settings in my post QR Codes: In the Classroom which included;

• lectures and lecture slides,
• hand outs and printed materials,
• surveys,
• textbooks,
• libraries (linking to eBook versions),
• assignments,
• induction activities,
• campus tours,
• etc

How these things can be used is very dependent on the topic you want to cover; if you’re talking about the UK Spending Review and changes to the funding for Higher Education why not use them in your printed literature to point to

• YouTube video(s) of the demonstrations to illustrate a point;
  
• Google Maps of where the demonstration happened;
  
• Copy of Lecture slides hosted on Institutional VLE or somewhere like SlideShare;
  
• If nothing else, you could store your contact details in the code, or link to your vCard so students can scan and store your details for future use in their phones (name, office location, surgery hours, email, etc);
  

The list of possible applications go on.

Are you using them with your students or colleagues? If you are, or planning to, then please share how you are doing this (going to do it) by leaving a comment.

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I’ve been pondering whether or not to get a Kindle since I heard about the latest wifi or 3G version … so long in fact that both my parents have now passed me and got one each! I may not have such a device, but I have shown them how to connect them to their home wireless broadband and download books.

I am still unsure as to if, not when, I will get a Kindle. My reason is that I have installed the Kindle app for my iPhone and can download and read Kindle books like that, as well as link it the the Whispersync system and read them on my laptop (should I wish). I am toying with an iPad, which will also use the Kindle for iPhone app, therefore continue my reading in this medium … which is where a tablet eReader will outperform an eInk one. Let me explain.

This thought first came to me from my work and reading around the use of QR Codes in education, where a QR Code is displayed in the paper-version of the academic textbook so the student can find online video or web links of the content / theory / etc the chapter or page is currently explaining. What if this is ported to non-fiction and fiction books as well? You could have an interactive version of Jules Verne’s “Around the World in 80 Days” where you could:

• link to maps of the city where the characters have just arrived (ancient as well as current maps, Google maps anyone?),
• images and video of the different areas where they find themselves,
• video clips of film version of the book (1956 & 2004, as well as Michael Palin’s BBC adventure in 1989),
• link to explanations of language and dialects that may be difficult to understand their meaning

Well, why not?

Here’s a few suggestions for the kind of content I see in something like ‘Around the World in 80 Days’ :

[View as Slideshow]

For new books it would be harder to be written without a back-up team generating and finding the copyright to the various different digital elements you wanted to use, and for the publication of older books (like the Around the World in 80 Days’ I downloaded for free) would be costly for not much return … but just think what it could do for the younger readers, it could really bring a story alive, in the original text (not cut-down film version), in a more modern & multi-media way.

If the above is already being done then please elt me know as I have not found anything like it … if it isn’t being done yet then you know where you heard from first (here and in an answer on Quora I made earlier this week!).

Update: May 6th, 2011

This is the kind of thing I was talking about in the original post here – a ‘new’ eBook standard demonstrated by PushPopPress;

Al Gore’s Our Choice Guided Tour from Push Pop Press on Vimeo.

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I have used Google Earth a few times in some eLearning packages I’ve put together, mainly to demonstrate location or distance, but what else is it useful for? Well, that all depends on what age of student you have, and what you want them to achieve in the activity.

I came across this excellent list of uses for Google Earth in Education, and a great list of 50 Ideas for the Classroom.

The post starts by saying:

“Google Earth has opened up potential for students in classrooms around the globe with its bird’s-eye view of the world. Whether you are a veteran teacher looking for new ways to teach old topics or you are a still an education student getting ready to make your debut in the classroom, these exciting ways to use Google Earth are sure to infuse your lessons with plenty of punch.”

I’ll not replicate the article here, so you’ll have to click the link above for the full list (split into the different age ranges of students) but here are a few choice activities for the different ages, from Primary to higher education;

• Using the Ruler Tool to Measure in Google Earth - How about this one, it shows the teacher how to get the children to measure distances in Google Earth.
• Google Earth Ocean - This allows students to explore the oceans and all that is within and around them.
• Weather and Storm Tracking Tools in Google Earth - Use these tools to study weather and even track storms.
• All Quiet on the Western Front – World War One battlefields;  read the eBook, then study the locations.

If your new to Google Earth and want to know more, then you ought to read a few websites that are good at introducing the application and it’s uses. A few to start you off are;

• Google for Educators
• Juicy Geography
• Teaching with Google Earth
• 345 Google earth Lesson Plans

Of course you’ll need to have Google Earth installed first – it’s free and available here. Another really good tool to use is the browser plugin - Google Earth API – which lets you “embed Google Earth, a true 3D digital globe, into your web pages. Using the API you can draw markers and lines, drape images over the terrain, add 3D models, or load KML files, allowing you to build sophisticated 3D map applications.”

If you’ve used Google Earth yourself and would like to share your experience, and even the activity you used it in, then please leave a comment.

Image source.

Related posts:

1. Google Wave: 100 tips & tricks
2. Is Google Making Our E-Learning Stupid?
3. Google Wheel