Last week Apple unveiled its ambitious digital textbook platform integrated into the new iBooks ecosystem. Major publishers signed up and have been working with Apple for some time, ironing out the kinks before the project went live on Thursday. Since then, over 350,000 digital textbooks have been downloaded, according to Global Equities Research.
Not only is Apple making a huge push into the educational textbook market, but they have empowered indie authors with a feature rich toolkit to sell their own books in iBooks. We initially broke this news three weeks ago with our contact in Apple and I am personally very happy there is finally an easy to use platform to edit and submit your books. Over 90,000 downloads of the new Author program have been downloaded directly from Apple and currently only works with the MAC operating system.
“Our research indicates that Apple has a very strong following with Authors, Publishers, Faculty and Students and may capture 95% of Digital Textbook Market, while Amazon.com may only participate in the 5% of the market,” Analyst Trip Chowdhry wrote in the Global Equities Research report.
It is safe to say that the textbook program is off to a great start and students stand to benefit mightily from the low-cost alternative to buying tangible books in the campus bookstores. It seems Apple and publishers will continue to make a ton of money in this new initiate because it is totally dependent on people owning an iPad and purchasing textbooks. You might say its a win win for Apple and for students in this grand digital age.
Michael Kozlowski is the editor-in-chief at Good e-Reader and has written about audiobooks and e-readers for the past fifteen years. Newspapers and websites such as the CBC, CNET, Engadget, Huffington Post and the New York Times have picked up his articles. He Lives in Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada.
