The Digital Reader

Here are 5 interesting stories for this fine Monday morning.

Alt Text: New Ideas to Turn E-Readers Into Me-Readers

E-readers are heating up, and not just in the hand-warming sense. Nooks and Kindles just underwent a price drop, iBook has come to the iPhone, and the iPad is still selling millions and inspiring enraged tweets from people who are unhappy when other people spend money on things they, themselves, don’t want.

New York Elementary Schools Adopting Digital Curriculum

Twenty-one elementary schools in New York are adopting digital curricula for the 2010-2011 school year. Beginning this fall, these schools will start shifting to a digital platform for math and reading designed for 1:1 classroom environments.

Roll-Up Computers and Their Kin

“The paper book is dead,” says the digital visionary Nicholas Negroponte.

So what’s next for these digital book replacements? Will the e-reader be reduced to a tiny chip that can be implanted in our retina by 2015? Not quite, but those who think a lot about the future say e-readers are set to take on new shapes and sizes, and their prices will continue to fall.

Ten More Commandments, Publishing Edition

The following post is a collaboration with my friend Joe Esposito, the CEO of GiantChair. The post was Joe’s idea, but I contributed enough to its completion to justify a claim of shared authorship. Joe has kindly agreed to allow this received wisdom to be delivered to the world through The Shatzkin Files.

Whitcoulls claims to have sold thousands of Kobos

Managing director Peter Kalan says New Zealanders have snapped up thousands of Kobos – the first two shipments – and Whitcoulls was taking pre-orders for the third shipment, due to arrive mid-July. “Demand has been great, it’s far exceeded what we expected.”