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Apple Announces New iBooks Software to 'Reinvent the Textbook'

By Leslie Albrecht | January 19, 2012 11:27am
Apple unveiled iBooks 2 on Wednesday, which the company said would revolutionize textbooks.
Apple unveiled iBooks 2 on Wednesday, which the company said would revolutionize textbooks.
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Apple

UPPER EAST SIDE —  Apple unveiled new iBooks software Thursday looking to "reinvent the textbook" and make good on founder Steve Jobs' vow to revolutionize education.

At a packed 10 a.m. press event at the Guggenheim Museum, Apple's Paul Schiller said iBooks 2 will transform iPads into fully featured textbooks with video, interactive objects, and thumbnail navigation, in addition to just text and pictures, Gizmodo reported.

Quizzes, review questions and a glossary will be built-in to the learning devices, reports said.

"Clearly, no printed book can compete with this," said Roger Rosner, Apple's vice president of productivity applications, Engadget reported.

In Walter Isaacson's biography of late Apple co-founder Steve Jobs, the tech pioneer spoke of his desire to use digital publishing to transform education. Jobs, who died in October 2011, "had set his sights on textbooks as the next business he wanted to transform," Isaacson wrote.

But Wednesday's presentation made no mention of how schools could pay for the new technology, the Wall Street Journal noted.

"Conspicuously absent in Apple presentation (thus far) has been any mention of how schools and students, both often short on cash, will be able to afford iPad-based textbooks," the Journal reported. "Even if the books are free or cheap, the device is still pretty pricey.