The future of textbooks?

January has been a busy month for librarians. Not only were a lot of new books unveiled at ALA's Midwinter meetings, but tech news kept coming out too. One of the products that's causing the most buzz is a tablet e-reader designed to replace textbooks. Take a look at the story in the LA Times and also take a look at the video of how a textbook appears on the Kno. Although the designers appear to be looking at the college market right now, it's also clear that textbooks for high school and elementary school could easily appear on this format. In fact Jon Bard of Write 4 Children predicts that the future of children's publishing is likely to lie in the use of a tablet like Kno. The double screen allows it to be opened like a book, a feature that is comforting to book readers and protects the screen. The full-color illustrations rival anything that can be produced on paper and for textbooks, information can be quickly updated. Many textbook producers are planning to make some of their content available for testing on the Kno. Libraries should keep watching this trend.