Apple announced its new digital textbook product last week during a press conference in New York City and some analysts are already viewed the company’s efforts as an early success. According to Global Equity Research analyst Trip Chowdry, Apple sold approximately 350,000 iBooks textbooks within the first three days of availability. Using Global Equity’s third-party tracking system, Chowdry also estimates that Apple’s iBooks Author tools was downloaded 90,000 times during the same period, AllThingsD reports. Those numbers would certainly be impressive, but Apple has not announced any numbers with regard to its new iBooks textbooks product. It is also unclear what percentage of Chowdry’s estimates went to students and what percentage went to curious iPad owners looking to sample Apple’s new interactive textbook product.

Read

Apple on Thursday unveiled a new version of its iTunes U product from a press conference in New York City. Apple’s Eddy Cue was on hand to reveal a new iOS version of iTunes U, bringing users an iBooks-like interface through which they can access iTunes U content. iTunes U has served 700 million downloads to date, and it has primarily been used for lectures. The new version of iTunes U gives teachers a variety of new tools to create and manage curriculums, and they can also use the app to give assignments to their classes or even stream live content. Students can take notes in the app just as they can in Apple’s new digital textbooks, and courses from a number of universities including Yale and Harvard are currently available. iTunes U for iPad is available immediately for free in the iOS App Store.

Apple may be working on bolstering its educational content in order to drive the adoption rate of iPads in schools. Apple is holding a press event in New York City tomorrow where we will no doubt hear more on what the company has planned for education. “Apple will raise a lot of awareness about digital textbooks and how education is going digital,” Osman Rashid, the CEO of e-textbook software firm Kno Inc. told Bloomberg. The latest reports suggest the Cupertino-based company will unveil “tools that make it easier to publish interactive textbooks,” Bloomberg explained. The new tools should allow writers to publish content on their own, which is similar to what Amazon’s self-publishing service currently provides. Sources speaking to Bloomberg said that teachers might be able to create lessons and workbooks for students and then have their classes complete the lessons on an iPad.

Read

As revealed in his authorized biography, Steve Jobs figured out the secret to making a truly user friendly television ahead of his untimely passing. But a reimagined TV wasn’t the only revolutionary product Jobs had a hand in that we have yet to see come to fruition. According to several reports, Apple plans to unveil a new product at a press conference on Thursday that it hopes will change the way students use textbook. Read on for more.

Citing unnamed sources familiar with the plans, The Wall Street Journal reports that Apple will reveal a new digital textbook product on Thursday that will give publishers a platform with which to create interactive educational materials optimized for the iPad. The announcement will include partnerships with multiple publishers according to the report, and at least one, McGraw-Hill, has been working with Apple on its new iPad textbook product since June.

According to Walter Isaacsson’s authorized biography, Steve Jobs had been meeting with a number of publishers and he thought all textbooks should be “digital and interactive, tailored to each student and providing feedback in real time.”

Apple will not be the first company to introduce digital textbooks to the market, but it is perhaps in the best position to deliver a product with the potential to succeed on a wide scale. Multiple universities have already begun to test programs that involve distributing iPads to students, and Apple’s tablet is by far the most popular slate on the market today. Additionally, a less expensive iPad 2 model expected to be released when Apple launches its next-generation iPad 3 will make the iOS tablet line even more accessible.

“Who better than Apple to revolutionize textbooks?” IDC analyst Al Hilwa told The Journal. “Everyone, including the industry and universities, have to come together, and this is the kind of thing Apple does really well.”

Remember those rumors about Apple holding a mid-to-late January event in NYC? Well, invites just went out to media, and focus is on education as some had rumored. We’d imagine one of the event focal points to be on reinventing and transforming the textbook industry.

Developing…

Apple has quietly launched a new entry-level iMac that targets education. The new model features a 21.5-inch display like the current base iMac, but the specs are dialed down in order to push pricing to a slightly more attainable starting point. Highlights include a 3.1GHz Intel Core i3 dual-core processor, 2GB of DDR3 RAM, a 250GB hard drive and an AMD Radeon HD 6750 GPU. Pricing starts at $999, 11% higher than the last iMac aimed at the education market, and the new model is available immediately to education customers on Apple’s website.

Major textbook publishers, including McGraw-Hill, Pearson, Kaplan, and Houghton Mifflin Harcourt K-12, have completed a deal with software company ScrollMotion Inc. to prepare their textbook offerings for digital outlets like the iPad. Textbook publishers, having seen the impact of technology and the internet on the newspaper industry, are desperately trying to stay ahead of the technology curve and viable well into the 21st century. Rik Kranenburg, group president of higher eduction at McGraw-Hill had this to say: “Nobody knows what device will take off, or which ‘killer app’ will drive student adaptations. Today they aren’t reading e-textbooks on their laptops. But ahead we see all kinds of new instruction materials.” The Wall Street Jounal, citing a report by research firm Compass Intelligence, predicts technology spending among educational institutions will increase $14.3 billion over a five year period (tracked from 2008 to 2013); a figure publishing companies clearly are not going to ignore. Check out the WSJ article for all the details.

Read

UPDATE: Couple commenters and other people wrote in… this seems to simply be the older 17″ aluminum iMacs that are discounted for educational institutions.

[Via Giz]

Read