DynamicBooks to allow texbooks to be rewrote by instructors.

In a page borrowed to Wikipedia, Mcmillan, one of the five largest publishers of trade books and textbooks, has announced plans to introduce a software called DynamicBooks that will allow college instructors to edit digital editions of textbooks and customize them for their individual classes, according to the New York Times.
Quoting the paper, "professors will be able to reorganize or delete chapters, upload course syllabuses, notes, videos, pictures and graphs," and most interestingly, "rewrite or delete individual paragraphs, equation or illustrations."
The way the software is set up, instructors will have the power to go online, log on to the authoring tool and make whatever change they want without even the need for prior authorization.
The program is set to start in August when 100 titles will be available for sale through DynamicBooks.
One of the advantage of the DynamicBooks edition is that the titles offered will sell for much less than the the price of other ebooks because of their personalized character.

For more, see NYTimes.com

Bigwords is a free iPhone app that helps find deals on texbooks.

On the eve of a new school year, college students everywhere are gearing up to face a dreadful ritual: where to find and how to pay for those ever costly textbooks. With college textbooks averaging $100 a piece, it is no secret that they represent one of the biggest expenses for college students who spend between $700 and $1,100 a year in that category. This is not new considered the fact that a 2004 federal study found that Textbooks prices nearly tripled from 1986 to 2004, rising an average of 6 percent a year or twice the inflation rate. With that in mind, it was just a matter of time before the ubiquitous iPhone and the ever growing Apple's apps store appears in the picture with a solution. It comes in the form of a free app called Bigwords from a company by the same name.
The the app works by taking the burden of searching for availability and price comparisons off the shoulders of users. Whether you are looking to buy a new, used, digital books or just renting, all you have to do is enter the books' titles, authors or ISBN codes into the app vast database and hit the price-comparison button.
From there, the app goes to work searching about 30 different sources like Amazon.com, CourseSmart.com, textbooks.com and figures out the best deal by taking in consideration, factors like shipping costs and any discounts you may be entitled to.
Searches can be customized so to look for books by their condition, exclude books from third-party sellers like the ones on eBay, or from specific stores.
To complete your transaction, you have the choice to stay within the app and do it right there or you can have your "shopping bag" transferred to a PC via e-mail for finalization at your convenience.
To make its point, Bigwords claims that the average saving is 66% for new books and more than 35% over online purchases made without using it.


For more, see NYTimes.com

CourseSmart LLC offers e-texbooks free for subscribers, on iPod.

The Wall Street Journal is reporting that CourseSmart LLC , an e-textbooks provider for college students with more than 7,ooo titles, is making its collection available on Apple's iPhone and iPod Touch, free for its subscribers.
Typically, students rent an e-book for 180 days and during that period, they will have full access to their textbooks, can consult their digital notes and do researches for a specific word or phrases right from their iPod or iPhone.
At the end of the subscription period, students will lose access to the titles. But at nearly 5o% savings per tittle for 18o days which is typically the length of a semester, that is not a bad trade off considered the short shelf life of a physical book and the hassle of figuring out what to do with it at the end of a term.