A rare occurrence may be headed our way. A convergence of old media and new media with new technology that may not only benefit both media industries but just might help the health of our children and generations to come.
If there was ever a dinosaur media industry that was just asking for extinction that wasn't the newspaper business it would be the textbook industry. We're talking media technology that hasn't changed very much in over a hundred years. I remember some of the books that I used in school had been around for years. You'd find names of a half dozen students or more that had used the same text book year after year after year. The world doesn't turn at that leisurely pace anymore. When the Berlin Wall fell and took the U.S.S.R. with it shortly thereafter history books, geography books, political science books all became instantly obsolete. And that meant an enormous expense for cash strapped school districts. Well that may be changing in the very near future.
A group of some of the top text book publishers are working with software companies plus folks like Apple's iPad, Amazon's Kindle and netbook manufacturers to put the next generation of textbooks on high tech personal devices. It's very forward thinking by the textbook folks who unlike TV, music and newspapers are actually paying attention to the writing on the wall. The move isn't surprising at all for the Apple folks. Getting their products into student hands has been one of the smartest business moves they ever made. And the benefit to our kids health? That's easy. No more 40, 50 or 60 pound backpacks for kids any more. All their textbooks on a single device. Textbooks that can be updated just as quickly as updating software on your computer. And eliminating the unreasonable influence that large school systems like the Texas schools have on what goes into the nation's textbooks. The board that controls history texts in Texas recently tried a little revisionist history by eliminating folks that they didn't like.
The really exciting part is that electronic textbooks could offer many more resources. Built in media, search engines, glossaries and interactive quizzes would only scratch the surface. The devices could also offer note taking functions so that everything needed could be in a single device. The real question is what exactly this digital hand held educational system might look like. That's why this cooperative effort among the various parties may offer the best chance of coming up with the proverbial "killer app".
After that it's just a matter of figuring out what the notebook manufacturers are going to do and what we're going to put in all these empty back packs.
Call that the View From the Phlipside.
"The View From the Phlipside" airs on WRFA-LP Jamestown NY. You can listen to WRFA online HERE
Copyright - Jay Phillippi 2010
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