[Athen] Thoughts on iPad textbooks announcement

[Doug Hayman]

We were gridlocked and cabin-bound here in Seattle last week when Apple 
made their latest announcement about textbook creation for use with the 
iPad.

I downloaded a few of the samples in their new iBooks 2 app and like the 
features offered by those including a likely lower price, multimedia 
presentations, and highlighting & study cards.

I haven't explored them using voiceover yet and wondering if others on 
this list have gotten a chance to explore this new offering.  If so, what 
are your thoughts, especially in regard to accessibility?

Here are some links for those who haven't checked this out yet:

iBooks Author application:
http://www.apple.com/ibooks-author/

Link to the video announcement:
http://events.apple.com.edgesuite.net/1201oihbafvpihboijhpihbasdouhbasv/event/index.html

Some not-too-surprising limitations of the authoring tool, the audio files 
cannot be mp3 but instead must be AAC files and video needs to be 
in quicktime format.

I'm imagining that if the initial publishers jump on the bandwagon and 
start cranking out a lot of books they'd have the opportunity to craft 
accessible content if they make plans for it early on in their process. 
Otherwise they'd replicate what has happened with web content for years.


Doug Hayman <dhayman at u.washington.edu>
Technology Specialist
DO-IT Program (Disabilities, Opportunities, Internetworking, Technology)
UW Technology Services
Box 354842
Seattle, WA 98195
(206) 221-4165
http://www.washington.edu/doit