e-books

The Amazon
By Marcos Antonio de Lima Filho | Master in Design | Federal University of Pernambuco – Brazil

This is a free book which is available in iBooks 3.0+ on the iPad and/or using iTunes on your computer. Marcos designed this book to take advantage of all the interaction enabled by iPads.

156 images, 14 infographics, 18 galleries, 11 maps and 8 videos join with the text, which here is not the primary. Why? Because the nature is much too rich to be described only by words. The Amazon seeks to take advantage of all the technology advancements enabled by the tablet.

Great work Marcos! Nice interactivity, use of digital audio and video, graphics, and more. Check it out!

E-books could be the future of social media — from fastcolabs.com by Michael Grothaus

Excerpt (emphasis DSC):

Both Apple and Amazon were designing e-book readers by copying the 2,500-year-old idea of books as self-contained collections of words, completely missing how readers share and discuss content online today. While most e-readers allow you to share passages or links to the book you are reading, and sites like Goodreads let you share what you’ve read, their implementations treat the book and the discussions around them as separate collections. Worse, these apps force users to venture into the distracting world of the open Internet when they want to share, making it hard to stay focused on reading.

This didn’t sit well with Berggren, so he came up with an ingenious solution: Make each and every book its own self-contained social network.

From DSC:
When people urge us to do things differently due to the technologies at our disposal, this is a great example of that. It rethinks what can be done now vs. how it has been done in the past. I like the increased opportunities this type of big-thinking, innovative solution offers for increased participation, collaboration, and discussion.

Questions that come to my mind:

How might this affect what’s possible with digital storytelling? With transmedia?
Could each MOOC/course/stream of content be its own social network?
“The app itself is free, so the company makes money by selling anonymized data it collects about its users’ consumption habits to publishers.” Will we see more of this type of business model?

Also see:

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Also see:

From managing learning to building an Enterprise Learning Network — by Jane Hart

Addendum on 9/10/13:

Content as a Service (CaaS) — from knowledgestarblog.wordpress.com by David Grebow

Excerpt:

The etextbook in 2018 will be dramatically different than the etextbook of today. It will be coupled to an app that will provide you with Content as a Service (CaaS). CaaS will include many of the following features (and more that have yet to be imagined):

Multimedia
Simulations
Educational Games
Animations
Pre- and post-tests
Formative and Summative Quizzes
Adaptive testing
Networked Social Learning
Study groups
Analytic Datasets
Virtual and Flipped classes
Communities of Learning and Practice
Virtual classes.

Very sharp!!! A glimpse into the future of digital video & online learning! Lifelong learners of the world, let me hear some noise! [Christian]

On 07/09/2013, in 21st century, 24x7x365 access, A/V -- audio/visual, active learning, adult learning, attention, convergence, creativity, Daniel S. Christian, digital audio, digital learning, digital storytelling, digital textbooks, digital video, e-books, e-publishing related items (EPUB and more), education technology, educational games / serious games, elearning, emerging technologies, engagement / engaging students, entrepreneurship, experimentation, heutagogy, higher education, homeschooling/homeschoolers, human-computer interaction (HCI), innovation, interaction design, interactivity, interface design, internet, K-12 related, learning ecosystem, Learning from the Living [Class] Room, learning preferences, lifelong learning, love of learning, motivation, multi-touch, multimedia, new media literacies, online learning, online media, participation, presentations, student-related, technologies for your home, transmedia, trends, user experience (UX), user interface design, vision/possibilities, by Daniel Christian

From DSC:
First, take a look at this interactive video from the Wall Street Journal:

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For further information on that video, you can also see:

‘Obamacare’ Made Easy to Understand — from /live.wsj.com
David Wessel discusses a new WSJ.com interactive video that helps viewers better understand the Affordable Health Care Act as well as its slate of rules and penalties.

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From DSC:

Excellent, creative use of technology! Lifelong learners of the world, let me hear some noise! Your learning futures just got much more interesting, dynamic, and interactive!

You will be given more choice and more control than you’ve ever had before. You will be able to interact with digital videos, drill down, take some rights turns and come back again, and more.

For example, during the WSJ video, you can click on the radio within the digital video in order to “drill down” and listen to more about a certain topic — while the main presentation “holds on”…

…you can jump ahead to the next marker…pause…rewind…click to get some further text-based information/details on a topic of interest:

…and more. In other words, you have more choice, more control in your learning experience. This, at minimum, is a piece of online learning’s — and digital video’s — future.

But I hear you saying, so what? Flash has been doing this for a while now. And that, my friends, is the only downside I see in this implementation from the WSJ — it was done using Flash.

As Flash won’t fly on iOS-based devices, an HTML5-based solution needs to come into the picture…and this is where Touchcast shines!

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As Paul Sawers explains, you can add interactive, browsable layers onto your video and deliver it in an HTML5-based format.

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An excerpt from Paul’s article:

Things start to get really interesting with video apps (vApps). TouchCast lets you create videos that are layered with live Web pages, video clips, maps, Twitter streams and other facets of the digital world. “We’re actually claiming that this is the future of the Web,” says Segal, TouchCasts’s CEO.

Indeed, TouchCast’s vApp library is ‘open’, so developers can create and customize their own vApps.

Bottom line:
“Digital textbooks” will never be the same again (not to mention learning modules, transmedia, ads, presentations, digital storytelling, and more)!

Also see:

TouchCast aims to redefine the web video

Here’s why the TV apps economy will be a $14 billion business [Wolf]

On 06/25/2013, in 21st century, 24x7x365 access, A/V -- audio/visual, analytics, animation, Apple, Artificial Intelligence/Agents/LLMs/and Related, blended learning, Bring your own device (BYOD), business, business side of he, changing business models, cloud-based computing / apps / other cloud-related, collaboration, communications, communities of practice, computer science, content development, aggregation, repositories, convergence, corporate / business world, corporate universities / corporate training, cost of getting a degree, Daniel S. Christian, digital audio, digital learning, digital storytelling, digital textbooks, digital video, distance education, e-books, e-publishing related items (EPUB and more), e-readers, education, education technology, educational games / serious games, elearning, emerging technologies, engagement / engaging students, entrepreneurship, experimentation, future of higher education, game-changing environment, heutagogy, higher education, human-computer interaction (HCI), innovation, interactivity, internet, IT in HE, K-12 related, learning agents, learning ecosystem, Learning from the Living [Class] Room, learning preferences, learning spaces, lifelong learning, machine-to-machine communications, marketing/social marketing, marketplaces, mirroring and/or multiple devices, mobile learning, more voice more choice more control, multi-touch, multimedia, music, New "Amazon.com" of Higher Education, new business models, new media literacies, online learning, online media, online tutoring, open courseware and systems, passions, personalized/customized learning, play, podcasting, professional development, programming, reinvent, second screen apps, smart classrooms, smart/connected TV, social learning / networks, staying relevant, storytelling, streams of content, student-related, tablets, teaching & learning, technologies for your home, telepresence, training / L&D, transmedia, trends, ubiquitous learning, videoconferencing, virtual field trips, virtual K-12 schools, Virtual Reality (VR) / worlds / learning, virtual tutoring, vision/possibilities, web-based collaboration, webinars, workplace, by Daniel Christian

Here’s why the TV apps economy will be a $14 billion business — from forbes.com by Michael Wolf

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Excerpt:

According to new research published this week, the TV apps economy is forecasted to reach $14 billion by 2017.

…

Take for example today’s news that Apple will begin selling video advertisements served by iAd through iTunes Radio loaded on Apple TVs. This is only the first move for Apple in this space, and others like Samsung and Google are already investing heavily in connected TV app advertising.

From DSC:
Why post this? Because:

It lays out future directions/careers related to Programming, Computer Science, Data Mining, Analytics, Marketing, Telecommunications, User Experience Design, Digital and Transmedia Storytelling, and more
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It leads to “Learning from the Living [Class] Room”

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From DSC:
And if this does take off,
$14 billion won’t begin to capture the profits from this new industry.
It will be far larger than that.

Relevant addendum on 6/27/13:

The future of cinema is on demand — from bitrebels.com by Ben Warner (From DSC: Having just paid $32 for 4 people — 3 of whom were kids — to see Monsters U, I believe it!)
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Via: [The Verge] Image Credits: [Venture Beat] [Home Theater]

Self Publishing Using iBooks Author [JAMF]

On 06/12/2013, in Apple, e-books, e-publishing related items (EPUB and more), e-readers, new business models, publishing, by Daniel Christian

Description
Self Publishing Using iBooks Author is aimed towards introducing you to using to Apple’s powerful eBook authoring software, the new possibilities it provides, and help start you on the path to creating your very own books to share and distribute.

Being an eBook about iBooks Author, created using iBooks Author, we will take advantage of this and explore every facet of this software while demonstrating on the pages how we went about creating the layouts and designs you see using iBooks Author’s many features.

Free.
Available on iPad.

My reflections on Katherine Brodsky’s interesting article: “The new storytelling frontier”

On 06/11/2013, in 21st century, A/V -- audio/visual, attention, Canada, creativity, digital audio, digital learning, digital storytelling, digital video, e-books, e-publishing related items (EPUB and more), education technology, educational games / serious games, elearning, emerging technologies, engagement / engaging students, entrepreneurship, experimentation, flipping -- inverted learning, higher education, homeschooling/homeschoolers, human-computer interaction (HCI), hybrid learning, immersion, innovation, interactivity, internet, learning ecosystem, Learning from the Living [Class] Room, machine-to-machine communications, media/film, memory, mirroring and/or multiple devices, mobile learning, multimedia, Near Field Communication (NFC), online learning, online media, participation, play, second screen apps, smart/connected TV, social learning / networks, social media, story, storytelling, streams of content, student-related, technologies for your home, television, transmedia, trends, ubiquitous learning, user experience (UX), user interface design, web-based collaboration, by Daniel Christian

The New Storytelling Frontier — from huffingtonpost.ca by Katherine Brodsky

Excerpts (emphasis DSC):

Long gone are the days of static content. Consumers are looking for more and transmedia storytelling offers an increasingly popular approach for creating property-based universes. Transmedia content itself is also evolving. It’s becoming more dynamic, more interactive, offering greater opportunities to engage audiences with creative user-generated content that adds to the storytelling experience. It is becoming more communal.

…

Although traditional models allow for greater control of content, strategies that can engage fans more actively and allow them to express themselves and even contribute to the development of a show, get them more involved and, ultimately, more willing to buy in.

From DSC:
As the use of storytelling is a powerful tool for learning, I can’t help but wonder…

What might be some creative possibilities arising from the developing world of transmedia that students and/or educational organizations could develop?
In what ways could we build more interactivity and social networking into our “digital textbooks” and mobile-based applications?
Would transmedia-based content help maintain interest, engagement, attention?
Would it help establish longer term memories/recall?
How might it help build students creativity and foster more experimentation/play/participation?
What roles might students play? (Writer, videographer, sound designer, actress, programmer, game designer, project manager, entrepreneur, etc.)
What tools and skills would students need to create their own transmedia-based experiences?
What new forms of storytelling might evolve from these efforts?
Could transmedia work its way into blended learning models?
Are new opportunities for immersing oneself in a particular subject matter becoming more available through transmedia-based experiences?
Could streams of content be wrapped in transmedia-based experiences?

Heads up Jony Ive! You need to see this brilliant concept for the Apple TV! Superb work by Sam Beckett!

On 05/31/2013, in 21st century, 24x7x365 access, A/V -- audio/visual, analytics, Apple, Artificial Intelligence/Agents/LLMs/and Related, attention, changing business models, cloud-based computing / apps / other cloud-related, convergence, cost of getting a degree, creativity, Daniel S. Christian, digital audio, digital learning, digital storytelling, digital textbooks, digital video, disruption, e-books, e-publishing related items (EPUB and more), education technology, educational games / serious games, elearning, emerging technologies, engagement / engaging students, experimentation, future of higher education, game-changing environment, Google, higher education, homeschooling/homeschoolers, human-computer interaction (HCI), IBM, innovation, instructional design, intelligent systems, intelligent tutoring, interaction design, interactivity, interface design, internet, learning agents, learning ecosystem, Learning from the Living [Class] Room, learning spaces, lifelong learning, love of learning, machine-to-machine communications, media/film, Microsoft, mirroring and/or multiple devices, mobile learning, mobile technologies, MOOCs -- Massive Open Online Courses, more voice more choice more control, multi-touch, multimedia, Near Field Communication (NFC), New "Amazon.com" of Higher Education, new business models, new media literacies, online learning, online media, online tutoring, personalized/customized learning, platforms, second screen apps, simulations, smart classrooms, smart/connected TV, social learning / networks, social media, streams of content, tablets, teaching & learning, technologies for your home, technology (general), telepresence, television, transmedia, trends, ubiquitous learning, user experience (UX), user interface design, using teams, videoconferencing, virtual field trips, virtual K-12 schools, Virtual Reality (VR) / worlds / learning, virtual tutoring, vision/possibilities, web-based collaboration, webinars, by Daniel Christian

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From DSC:
Now picture this from the educational standpoint — and what MOOCs could morph into. The foundation for some serious learning power (from the living room) seems to be developing!

Streams of content/learning channels/cloud-based applications that each of us can create and make available.

Voice recognition, learning analytics, machine-to-machine communications, transmedia and more! Wow!

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Below are some great resources re: creating your own e-books / streams of content — with thanks to Mr. Michael Haan, Technology Integration Specialist/Purchasing at Calvin College, for these resources
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Adobe DPS:
http://www.adobe.com/education/products/digital-publishing-suite.html
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Apple iBooks Author:
http://www.apple.com/ibooks-author/
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Creating ePub/eBook books in Pages:
http://support.apple.com/kb/HT4168
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Creating ePub/eBook in InDesign:
http://blogs.adobe.com/vikrant/2012/02/create-epub-ebooks-with-adobe-indesign/
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From DSC:
You might also want to check out Lynda.com for the relevant training materials.
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Let’s create our own streams of content — always up-to-date — plus we could help our students save big $$! And, as Michael pointed out, such tools could also be used internally for training-related and communications-related purposes.

Thanks Michael!!!

What's the best way to deal with ever-changing streams of content? When information has shrinking half-lives?

In other words, begin with… [EdTechTeacher.org]

On 05/02/2013, in 21st century, 24x7x365 access, assessment, blogs / blogging / vlogging, Bring your own device (BYOD), cloud-based computing / apps / other cloud-related, collaboration, creativity, design, digital audio, digital learning, digital photography, digital storytelling, digital textbooks, digital video, e-books, e-publishing related items (EPUB and more), e-readers, education technology, educational games / serious games, elearning, emerging technologies, engagement / engaging students, K-12 related, multi-touch, multimedia, new media literacies, online media, presentations, productivity / tips and tricks, videoconferencing, web-based collaboration, writing, by Daniel Christian

Excerpts from transmedia storytelling presentation by Gianluca Fiorelli

On 04/25/2013, in career development, communications, computer science, creativity, Daniel S. Christian, digital audio, digital learning, digital photography, digital storytelling, digital video, e-books, education technology, educational games / serious games, elearning, emerging technologies, engagement / engaging students, entrepreneurship, experimentation, human-computer interaction (HCI), immersion, informal learning, innovation, interactivity, internet, learning ecosystem, Learning from the Living [Class] Room, learning preferences, media/film, multimedia, new business models, new media literacies, online media, participation, platforms, play, programming, social media, story, storytelling, strategy, streams of content, transmedia, trends, user experience (UX), Virtual Reality (VR) / worlds / learning, by Daniel Christian

Notes from DSC:

Some of the material in this presentation or the website may not be appropriate for a younger audience.
Notice how many potential jobs/roles/positions/skillsets can be explored here!

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From DSC:
The word Bible is here not quite I think of as the Bible…but you’ll get the point if you review Gianluca’s presentation.
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Questions from DSC:

What opportunities might be presented by this type of trend within the worlds of education/training? (i.e. within K-12, higher ed, the corporate world)
What sorts of streams of contents could be created for educational/training-related purposes?
What sorts of open doors are now present within the world of communications? For a church, a school, a college, a business?
How can we incorporate the use of story more effectively in our teaching and learning environments? (If we could do this, we could greatly increase our students’ ROI.)

BII REPORT: Here’s why the “second screen” industry is set to explode — BusinessInsider.com

On 04/19/2013, in 21st century, 24x7x365 access, A/V -- audio/visual, analytics, animation, Artificial Intelligence/Agents/LLMs/and Related, Bring your own device (BYOD), cloud-based computing / apps / other cloud-related, convergence, cost of getting a degree, dangers of the status quo, Daniel S. Christian, data related items, digital audio, digital learning, digital storytelling, digital textbooks, digital video, disruption, distance education, e-books, e-publishing related items (EPUB and more), e-readers, education, education technology, educational games / serious games, elearning, emerging technologies, engagement / engaging students, entrepreneurship, experimentation, flipping -- inverted learning, game-changing environment, homeschooling/homeschoolers, human-computer interaction (HCI), innovation, intelligent systems, intelligent tutoring, interactivity, learning ecosystem, Learning from the Living [Class] Room, lifelong learning, machine-to-machine communications, mirroring and/or multiple devices, mobile learning, mobile technologies, MOOCs -- Massive Open Online Courses, more voice more choice more control, multi-touch, multimedia, Near Field Communication (NFC), New "Amazon.com" of Higher Education, new business models, online learning, online media, online tutoring, personalized/customized learning, second screen apps, smart/connected TV, social learning / networks, social media, storytelling, streams of content, student-related, technologies for your home, television, transmedia, trends, ubiquitous learning, videoconferencing, virtual field trips, virtual K-12 schools, Virtual Reality (VR) / worlds / learning, virtual tutoring, vision/possibilities, web-based collaboration, webinars, by Daniel Christian

BII REPORT: Here’s why the “second screen” industry is set to explode — BusinessInsider.com

Excerpt:

Here’s why the second screen industry will ultimately succeed:

Usage is growing rapidly
And mass acceptance isn’t even necessary
Second screen isn’t really a new activity
Second screen apps and sites are bridges

From DSC:
As this article alludes to, I wouldn’t rule the living room out in terms of where interactive, multimedia-based, educationally-related, second screen-based applications will turn up (apps backed up by data mining, AI, and opportunities for social learning). This area is poised for some serious growth.

7th graders publish their own textbook [Vincent]

On 01/21/2013, in active learning, digital learning, e-books, e-publishing related items (EPUB and more), participation, project-based learning, by Daniel Christian

7th graders publish their own textbook — from learninginhand.com by Tony Vincent

Also see:

Readz launches to provide publishers DIY solution to optimize content for tablets — from betakit.com by Humayun Khan
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7 outstanding free books for your iPad — from educatorstechnology.com
Excerpt:
Below is a list of some excellent books for your iPad. I have curated this list over the last couple of months and I kept adding to it every time I stumble upon a resource somewhere online.I don’t know if you like reading books on your iPad or not but let me tell you this: having at least a couple of titles installed on your iPad would really be of great help particularly in those moments when you are stuck somewhere and have nothing to do but waiting. Reading is a habit ( luckily a good one ) that we can ACQUIRE by force of habituation at least in the eyes of Skinnerian theory.The more you read , the fluent you get at reading and the more used your mind becomes to the act of reading. Check out these books I selected for you. All of them are free and require iBooks. Enjoy.

Addendum on 1/22/13:

College students develop apps to help kids with algebra — from USAToday.com

Learning Ecosystems

“The Amazon” — Nice work Marcos!

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