(This mail is focused on books, but the topic is of more general interest IMHO, thus foundation-l)
Hi all, I just saw the "iBooks Author" news: http://www.macrumors.com/2012/01/19/a-closer-look-at-ibooks-author-textbooks-and-exclusivity/ Of course, all these pretty books will be only available in the Apple paywalled garden. So I thought: As they use basically HTML5 (plus a few proprietary libraries), could we produce such interactive, tablet/phone-enabled e-books ("wBooks" as in "Wikimedia":-) from free content? I believe the answer is yes, though it might be quite a push technologically (just to be clear, I am speaking of the books here, not of the authoring software). Also: Should we? I believe the answer is yes as well, for two reasons. One, Apples work here might (yet again) set a new standard, which means everything falling short of that standard will be neglected by the target audience, which runs counter to our declared goal of disseminating free knowledge; standing still might well mean falling behind. Another reason is the opportunity that Apple creates for us here: Once such e-books become accepted as general teaching tools in schools, it will be much easier to switch from Apple-only, costly books to run-everywhere, free books; they might just win the "technology battle" for us. What do you think? Cheers, Magnus _______________________________________________ foundation-l mailing list [email protected] Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/foundation-l
