Digital Textbook platforms

2023. Pooks.ai creates personalized learning books



Pooks.ai is a new platform aimed to enhance reading and learning experience using AI. It provides a large collection of e-books and audiobooks, embeds personalized content in them and sets up individual preferences. AI personalized books are often generated in real-time or with minimal delay. Pooks.ai also tracks user learning style, preferred subjects/topics and even favorite historical period. E-books on Pooks.ai are available in PDF, EPUB and MOBI formats, while audiobooks are provided as m4b and .mp3 files. There is no cost for ebooks and $9.95 if you choose to add the audiobook.


2022. Pearson releases new curated videos in their textbook app



Pearson launched the digital textbook platform Pearson+ a year ago and they now have 4.5 million registered users and 330,000 paid subscribers. The company has recently unveiled several new features for the back-to-school season, including engaging and tailored content to suit students' preferred study methods and dynamic, interactive videos. The video system, known as Channels, includes over 10,000 short-form videos, curated, selected and organized by experts into 16 subject areas, with a focus on science, math and business—challenging topics where many students seek video-based tutoring. For this initial release, Channels is available to all college students at no cost, even if they are not using a Pearson textbook.

2021. Pressbooks adds Directory collections



Pressbooks Directory has undergone updates to enhance its usability and design, including the introduction of human-curated collections, which are groups of open educational resources (OER) organized around a specific theme or subject. These collections aim to showcase the best of OER, offering suggestions for individuals who are new to OER. Collections also serve as examples of high-quality OER, which can inspire the creation of new open textbook projects or be used as examples when advocating for investment in OER and open education. The resources in collections range from straightforward textbooks to interactive learning tools with multimedia and built-in student feedback and assessment, providing a range of examples to follow.


2019. Perlego - textbook subscription service



Dubbed “Spotify for textbooks,” Perlego allows students to access textbooks on a subscription model. It hosts over 300,000 eBooks from more than 2,300 publishers and the service is cross-platform—accessible via the web as well as iOS and Android apps—and available in several languages. In addition to U.K. publishers, Perlego now also features content from major publishers in Germany, the Nordics and Italy. For students, the appeal is clear: textbooks are becoming increasingly costly to buy and public libraries are often underfunded. In the U.K., Perlego provides access to its entire digital collection for £12 per month. As long as the required textbooks are available on the platform, this is significantly more economical.


2018. Perlego - Spotify for textbooks



The new service Perlego offers students and professionals unlimited access to hundreds of thousands of academic and professional eBook titles for £12 per month. To achieve this, it collaborates with 650 publishers, including prominent names like Oxford University Press, Princeton University Press, Macmillan Higher Education and Cengage Learning. Publishers receive 65 percent of each subscription on a usage-based model. Perlego claims it helps publishers monetize their content to a large group of budget-conscious students who might otherwise purchase their books from the used-book market or download pirated versions. It also provides publishers with detailed insights into the usage of their titles.


2015. New Kindle Textbook Creator allows to create ebooks for students



Amazon introduced a new tool for its Kindle Direct Publishing authors through a new KDP EDU branch aimed at educators and academic institutions. It's called the Kindle Textbook Creator and it allows authors to prepare digital textbooks for students, suitable for publication on Fire tablets, Android devices, iPhones, iPads, Macs and PCs. It’s somewhat similar to iBooks Author for Apple and iTunes U, but it starts with PDFs of existing texts and adds enhanced digital features for Kindle-based consumption. Kindle Textbook Creator appears to be designed for efficiency and for integration with the traditional textbook publishing industry, unlike iBooks Author, which is more focused on helping educators create digital-native experiences from scratch.


2014. Apple iBooks Textbooks Now Available in 51 Countries



Apple is broadening its educational service iBooks Textbooks into additional countries as part of its ongoing effort to dominate the global education sector. iBooks Textbooks, which provides interactive digital textbooks, is now accessible in 51 countries across Asia, Latin America, Europe and beyond. New countries gaining access to the platform include Brazil, Italy, Japan, Russia, Thailand and Malaysia. iBooks Textbooks allows publishers to create interactive, digital-native texts for students that can be used with the iBooks app on any Mac or iOS device. “We’re excited to see how educators in even more countries will develop their new lesson plans with interactive textbooks, apps and rich digital content,” Eddy Cue, Apple's SVP of Internet Software and Services, stated.


2013. Google Play to sell and rent digital textbooks



In August, Google will begin offering digital textbooks for purchase and rental through the Google Play Books store. Google has announced partnerships with the five largest textbook publishers, allowing students to buy or rent digital textbooks for up to six months. The company stated that prices would be “up to 80 percent” lower than print list prices, a similar claim made by Amazon for Kindle textbook rentals. While Google is already selling some digital textbooks through the Play store, these are not from major publishers and are not available for rental. Entering the textbook market positions Google to compete with Amazon, Barnes & Noble and Apple, all of which have already established a presence in the digital textbook industry.


2013. Kno Me helps students monitor their progress as they read



Kno, the intelligent educational book reading app (and retailer), unveiled a new offering today at CES - Kno Me. It’s a personalized study dashboard that aids students in tracking their progress as they read. The dashboard enables students to check-in to see real-time statistics on their study habits, time allocation, interaction rates and advancement. It allows students to view the average time they spend engaging with textbooks, the percentage of pages marked with annotations, glossary terms mastered and more. Users can then share these outcomes with classmates or track the engagement levels of their peers. Kno Me is currently accessible on all Kno interactive textbooks for iPad, Windows 8 and web browsers and will soon be compatible with Android and Windows 7.