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E-books, and prep for teacher and librarians, please, Barack—not just broadband: TeleRead, anyone?
December 7, 2008 | 11:23 am
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By David Rothman
Barack Obama wants a huge investment in infrastructure here in the States—both the highway and electronic varieties. America’s broadband penetration would be improved. And every child could tap away at a computer.
In the rush to modernize, however, Obama and his team should also press for sufficient resources for:
1. E-books and other items for schools and libraries—and creation of more—while respecting the First Amendment and allowing for a robust private sector. That means money for books from traditional publishers, as well as creation of wikis, blogs and the rest by teachers, with help from content experts. Textbook publishers might find new contracting opportunities here. Let’s remember all the obsolete textbooks still in use. In other areas, keep in mind the extent to which students can benefit from a wide variety of recreational reading items, including novels. Consider Norman Mailer’s wisdom on the benefits of linear narrative. Meanwhile, in this recession, let’s not forget the economies of e-books compared to paper.
2. Money for training of teachers and librarians to use the new technology—and maybe funds for student aides to help them out. Even many younger teachers are still baffled how to weave technology into their lessons. Librarians need training in e-book technology, as well as in Wikis and interbook linking. If the International Digital Publishing Forum won’t address the K-12-related interbook and shared annotations issues, then maybe Washington can offer a little push for e-book standards for the non-disabled (current federal requirements include the disabled). Remember, the IDPF’s ePub format is itself a descendant of standards encouraged by the National Institute for Standards and Technology.
3. E-book friendly machines that the students could take home. Much and perhaps most learning happens at home, as the organizers of One Laptop Per Child wisely recognized in making the X0-1 portable and planning its successor. Technology is moving fast enough so that even tiny machines in the future will be able to offer powerful multimedia capabilities. A convertible laptop form factor would be one possibility. Meanwhile, e-book standards like ePub should help assure that most of the books and other items could be displayed on a wide variety of machines such as cellhones.
4. Accompanying changes in copyright law. Telecommunications is a bigger job creator than entertainment, and our copyright laws should reflect that, especially since sharing within bounds can promote interactivity. I’d like to see the fair use altered changed to expand the percentage of a book or movie that users could use and swap without authorization from copyright holders; if nothing else, this would give a boost to wikis and documentaries.
Bottom line: Obama should keep in mind that our students need improved pedagogy and hardware—not just the wires and boxes alone. Do not fixate on the physical. Care about content, too, as well as ways to absorb it. Meanwhile, since TeleRead is an international blog, let’s remember that the same concepts here would apply to many other countries.
Related: Digital Promise moves ahead in D.C.: Basis for TeleRead-style efforts in time? Library e-books to benefit in a major way? Could Digital Promise be accelerated and included or made into law in coordination with the infrstructure package? Also see TeleRead, Obama, and text literacy vs. Kevin Kelly’s ‘screen literacy’ and E-books, Obama-Biden and Prohibition: Any hope of educating the Dems about anti-consumer laws like Bono and the DMCA?
Image credit: CC-licensed photo from David Edmonson.
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Comments:
What a sad state the US is in when every interest group thinks the federal government should tax people to invest in their favourite technology. Considering we are in the early days of eBook technology, the industry is growing incredibly fast as companies like Sony and Amazon push the technology. The eBook format has been embraced by libraries for many years. It is mostly the public’s preference for paper books that limits the popularity of eBooks.
Us proponents of eBooks should continue to educate people about the benefits of eBooks. And if you want to really encourage people to use eBooks, buy friends and family digital readers for Christmas. You could even donate a few to your local library or school if you are feeling generous. But it’s wrong to advocate that government takes other peoples money to spend on schemes to push your favourite technology.
If government really wanted to make learning cheaper and easier, it should end the monopoly on books granted to authors and publishers by abolishing copyright. Why play around the edges with “fair use” reforms? Either authors and producers have a right to decide how their creative works are used or they don’t. I claim they don’t insofar as it involves interfering with the peaceful dissemination of information.
Thanks, Robbie, but aren’t e-books a better, more economical way of replacing 20-year-old textbooks than p-books are? Same for bringing down the cost of library books? In this climate, tech can LOWER unit costs AND improve education and libraries with such capabilities as easier updating.
The technology is going to improve, and meanwhile there are ways of gracing making the best use of current tech for young people and others interested in using it.
As for fair use, I don’t want it substituted for fair compensation for writers and publishers. But when a grassroots documentary maker can’t even use short segments from Hollywood products without fear of being sued, we’ve got a problem.
Thanks,
David
I think training for teachers is a real issue. I took the additional qualification for teachers that allows me to teach computers, and it was a total joke. The most ‘taxing’ assignment we had was to create an 8-slide Powerpoint show, and there were people who struggled with this. As for my school, their response has been ‘We now have a teacher with the qualification, therefore the problem is solved.’ Meanwhile, all the other teachers are at the level of finding the 8-slide Powerpoint too taxing, and these are the people who make the schedules and decide that half-hour blocks should be more than enough to implement an IT curriculum with the children. It takes the Grade 1 kids ten minutes just to log in! I have some big issues with technology and teacher training that are probably too much to go into in a forum like this, but I can see in brief that what we need to get things modernized is going to be a more vast and costly under-taking than most people probably realize or appreciate.
Hi ficbot – you are so right, and for a good look at the structural challenges schools face and some ideas on how to address them, check out the book Disrupting Class – the authors have a blog here:
http://disruptingclass.mhprofessional.com/apps/ab/
Hi David,
I think you are right that ebooks should be embraced by schools and libraries since they can provide the same information for a fraction of the cost. But it is not the role of the federal government to implement these programs. For one thing, it is unconstitutional. For another, they would be bound to do it inefficiently and create more problems than they solve. There are major costs and difficulties associated with trying to replace paper books with ebooks and I can see many schemes failing. Such risks shouldn’t be taken with taxpayers’ money.
A better way would be for people to get involved at a community level by starting an ebook program at your local library or school. It may not be as grandiose as a federal government imposed ebook revolution but I think there is a much higher potential for success. Most importantly, such programs tap into local knowledge and allow different communities to experiment with different systems. A government program would likely be a one-size-fits-all approach that would result in inferior results (if not complete failure) at much higher costs.
As for expanding fair use versus abolishing copyright, I understand your fear that producers of creative content wouldn’t get compensated if people could freely copy their works. However people only have a right to earn what profits they can make through voluntary trade. People are not entitled to stop the exchange of information between 3rd parties because they fear it will hurt their profit margin.
I appreciate your further thoughts, Robbie. Actually I see TeleRead as a highly decentralized effort, with librarians in many cities participating. But the feds should play a role, given the efficiencies of scale and the fact that library spending varies so much at the local level. Talk about “savage inequalities”!
Nope, I don’t want Washington to pay for all library costs, and I think the idea should be to help everyone provide more and better books—not drag down the better library districts. A TeleRead-style approach could respect local differences and avoid “one size fits all.” Some books might be universally available, but in other cases local librarians could pick the ones most suitable for their users.
As shown by their high usage rates, public libraries are rather popular with taxpayers. And the efficiencies of E could help them get more for their money.
To address the copyright issue, you’re welcome to your opinion—I suspect you’re a libertarian or objectivist—but I myself remain a strong supporter of copyright even if the current system is broken.
I worked on The Solomon Scandals on and off for 30 years. While I’d have written the book with or without copyright, it’s a much better work than otherwise. I could toil away while knowing I had some chance of getting decent compensation. Will it actually happen? I don’t know. But given people’s needs to consider the welfare of their families, not just creative urges, I’m pro money-making.
By providing me with such incentives, the copyright system is doing its job—contributing to the progress of the arts and sciences. So three cheers for copyright even though the current system is hardly flawless!
Thanks,
David