EDUC+515+Case+Study+of+E+Readers

**Case Study of E Readers That Use E Ink** **What Are E Readers?** E Readers are portable electronic devices that are designed primarily to read text such as in novels, textbooks, magazines, newspapers, PDF files, and Word documents. They can also display images, such as the cover of a novel, a photo in a magazine, or a graphic from a textbook.

**What’s So Great About Them?** Even without an additional memory card inserted, most E Readers can hold hundreds of novels on them. With a memory card, the potential is in the tens of thousands. You can even check out free books to your e reader from your local library! Imagine a device that weighs as much as a single paperback but carries hundreds of books on it… If you never saw the benefit of an MP3 player, and didn’t think it was inconvenient to lug around your entire CD collection, the advantages to having an E Reader may be lost on you.

**E Ink** Although E Readers that have color LCD screens exist (and are probably more appealing to young adults because they seem to have an aversion to anything “black and white,”) I am choosing to focus solely on those E Readers that use E Ink (and therefore only come in black and white at the moment.) Personally, I’ve never enjoyed staring at a computer screen for very long, as my eyes seem to protest it. With E Ink, text and images are not backlit and can even be read outside in the sunlight, just like with a real book or magazine. Also, the benefit of E Ink is that it is very energy efficient, and can run for several weeks on one charge. For anyone who is going on a camping trip, or a long car ride or flight, this feature is definitely a bonus.

**Ugh! Is This In Black and White???** For those youngsters out there who throw a fit when they are forced to watch a black and white movie, they need not be afraid: A company in China called Hanvon Technology has recently introduced it’s E Reader that supports a color E Ink, capable of recognizing over 4,000 different colors. There currently are no plans for their pricey E Reader to be sold outside of China, and the initial reviews reported that the colors were not very saturated. However, this is exciting news because the technology will only become //better// and //cheaper//, and it’s only a matter of time before it’s available in this country, too.



**What Are the Top E Readers Using E Ink Available Today?**

The most affordable and or popular E Readers out there are as follows:

**1.)**  **Nook Touch from Barnes and Noble** **2.) Kindle from Amazon** **3.) Kobo Touch Edition (partnered with Border’s)** **4.) iRiver Story HD (partnered with Google)**

Check out this e reader blog, called the Good E Reader!

**This is a chart I made, comparing various features of the top four E Readers.**

media type="custom" key="10063669" Check out this fun video, comparing the Kindle to the Nook Touch! media type="youtube" key="2rY4QZfX2nA" height="349" width="560" <span style="color: #ff0000; font-family: 'Comic Sans MS',cursive; font-size: 130%;">**How Could E Readers Be Integrated Into School?** I think that the initial purchase of an E Reader should be the responsibility of the family. At only $139 (with the price inevitably falling as it does for all technology after awhile) parents can hardly put up a fuss when they know their child’s smart phone, gaming console, and MP3 player cost roughly the same. The beauty of having a student own an E Reader is that they can keep it over the summer, and through all of their grade levels (unless there is a good and affordable reason to upgrade.) Also, a student’s E Reader isn’t going to just have textbooks on it. They can have access to magazines, newspapers, comic books, blogs, dictionaries, encyclopedias, and novels. For families who have a financial burden and don’t even have the means to buy their children cell phones or MP3 players, the government should step in and provide the E Readers at a reduced price (just as they do for student lunches.) In some cases, I imagine the government will have to provide the E Reader for free. For families who constantly seem to be losing or breaking their E Readers, perhaps there could be some available in each classroom, that stay in the classroom. Perhaps they could even be checked out by the school for use on the weekends if there is need of them.

<span style="color: #ff0000; font-family: 'Comic Sans MS',cursive; font-size: 130%;">**Ethical Implications of E Readers in School Settings**

<span style="font-family: 'Comic Sans MS',cursive;">**For the Environment…** Shipping E Readers would weigh a lot less and therefore use a lot less fuel than shipping heavy textbooks would. (Take that, Climate Change!!) Ebooks don’t use paper and therefore don’t require us to cut down trees. (In your face, Global Warming!!)

<span style="font-family: 'Comic Sans MS',cursive;">**For Districts…** Once the initial financial hurdle of finding a way to supply E Readers to each student is jumped, districts could potentially save millions on only having to pay publishers for the ebook version of their texts and of course, foregoing shipping and handling fees. <span style="font-family: 'Comic Sans MS',cursive;">**For Teachers…** Teachers would no longer have to waste class time checking in and checking out textbooks at the beginning and end of each school year, and scouring each book for graffiti or other damage.

<span style="font-family: 'Comic Sans MS',cursive;">**For Students…** A new affinity for reading could possibly blossom as students relate to reading on a whole new, modern level. Also, we need not worry that students are secretly watching youtube or looking at a friend’s facebook page while on the E Reader because these devices don’t support webpages like a laptop does. E Readers currently only exist as devices that search for, download, storeand display documents.

<span style="font-family: 'Comic Sans MS',cursive;">**For Parents…** Ethically, I suppose it isn’t right to require parents to buy E Readers for their children. However, I propose that financial aid be available to parents in order to help them purchase E Readers. Maybe even make them tax deductable?

Publishers would probably take a hit in profits as ebooks are cheaper than regular books. However, the record industry learned to adapt to change (bye-bye Tower Records, hello iTunes) and I am confident that publishers will follow suit, rather than become obsolete.
 * <span style="font-family: 'Comic Sans MS',cursive;">For The Publishing Industry …**

<span style="font-family: 'Comic Sans MS',cursive;">**Final Thoughts on the Ethicality of E Readers** If the government would be willing to help out needy families with the purchase of an E Reader, I can’t think of any reason why it would be morally wrong to switch over to this new form of media. However, it would be wrong and mean to transition to E Readers and make “the poor kids” read from the “analog books.” The switch needs to be all or none, otherwise the difference between the haves and have-nots will become painfully obvious between peers.

Some might argue that the time-honored magic of reading from an actual book will be lost and fazed out as we raise a new generation of children who read only from electronic devices. To this I can only respond that the time-honored magic of reading is already in peril, and an E Reader may be the only way to re-kindle a love for it. (No pun intended!) Also, just as there are still record stores out there that specialize in vinyl records, I think there will always be a place in our hearts and on our shelves for real books.

<span style="color: #ff0000; font-family: 'Comic Sans MS',cursive; font-size: 130%;">**Implications for the Classroom Environment** The nature of learning for students would (hopefully) be more engaging and more relevant. Students are already biased towards everything digital, and changing the way they access books and read them would make the learning process more familiar, and frankly more respectable, in the eyes of a “digital native.” Having all of their favorite AND required reading material right at their fingertips, located on one lightweight device, is definitely something that would change the way students learn. This would eliminate the possibility of injured backs as there would no longer be any need to lug heavy textbooks to and from school. In regards to public libraries, students will no longer have to spend time searching for the overdue library book that went missing weeks ago because it would be located on their E Reader, and the library automatically removes it off of the device when it becomes due. Additionally, leaving school temporarily for independent studies would be a breeze, as all of the reading material would potentially be located on the E Reader.

The nature of teaching would also change from the use of E Readers. Teachers could easily search for and suggest free books for their students to download that are pertinent to a particular research project, or just plain old good reading. Word documents or PDF files the teacher creates for a lesson or even the day’s agenda and homework assignments could quickly and easily be downloaded onto each student’s E Readers. Also, teachers would have so much more space in their classroom if they didn’t have to house all of those big, heavy textbooks. And finally, they wouldn’t have to listen to all of the groans when they say, “Open your books and turn to page 186.” <span style="color: #ff00b9; font-family: 'Comic Sans MS',cursive; font-size: 21px; line-height: 31px;"> Evolution of the E Reader

<span style="color: #800000; font-family: 'Comic Sans MS',cursive; font-size: 160%;"> __1971__ <span style="color: #008000; font-family: 'Comic Sans MS',cursive; font-size: 150%;">A computer called "Dynabook" is created with the main purpose of presenting book contents electronically for reading. <span style="color: #008080; font-family: 'Comic Sans MS',cursive; font-size: 150%;">Project Gutenburg, a volunteer effort to digitize and archive cultural works begins. It offers full texts of public domain books. <span style="color: #800000; font-family: 'Comic Sans MS',cursive; font-size: 150%;">__1998__ <span style="color: #0015ff; font-family: 'Comic Sans MS',cursive; font-size: 150%;">The Softbook and Gemstar's Rocket E-book reader introduced to the market. <span style="color: #0015ff; display: block; font-family: 'Comic Sans MS',cursive; font-size: 150%; text-align: left; vertical-align: baseline;">Could only hold 40 e-books and had backlit LCD screens. <span style="color: #0015ff; display: block; font-family: 'Comic Sans MS',cursive; font-size: 150%; text-align: left; vertical-align: baseline;">It had to connect to a PC to download books. <span style="color: #0015ff; display: block; font-family: 'Comic Sans MS',cursive; font-size: 150%; text-align: left; vertical-align: baseline;">24 hour battery life.

<span style="color: #800000; font-family: 'Comic Sans MS',cursive; font-size: 160%;">__2004__ <span style="color: #008000; font-family: 'Comic Sans MS',cursive; font-size: 160%;">The Sony Librie was introduced in Japan. <span style="color: #008000; font-family: 'Comic Sans MS',cursive; font-size: 160%;">It was the first e reader to use e-ink. <span style="color: #008000; font-family: 'Comic Sans MS',cursive; font-size: 160%;">The battery lasted 5-6 days. <span style="color: #800000; font-family: 'Comic Sans MS',cursive; font-size: 160%;">__2007__ <span style="color: #800080; font-family: 'Comic Sans MS',cursive; font-size: 160%;">Amazon released it's Kindle e reader. E books were now able to be downloaded directly to the device from anywhere. __<span style="color: #800000; font-family: 'Comic Sans MS',cursive; font-size: 160%;">2009 __ <span style="color: #808000; display: block; font-family: 'Comic Sans MS',cursive; font-size: 160%; text-align: left;">Students of the private Canadian secondary school, Blyth Academy, are supplied with Sony Readers loaded with their text books. It is the first school in the world to do this. <span style="color: #008000; font-family: 'Comic Sans MS',cursive; font-size: 150%;">Barnes & Noble released the Nook Touch. __<span style="color: #800000; font-family: 'Comic Sans MS',cursive; font-size: 160%;">2011 __ <span style="color: #008080; font-family: 'Comic Sans MS',cursive; font-size: 160%;">iRiver Story HD is released. <span style="color: #000080; font-family: 'Comic Sans MS',cursive; font-size: 160%;">Kobo Touch Edition is released.

** The Future of E Readers... **

Personally, I can’t wait until E Readers become more like a personal organizer dedicated to academic needs. Aside from it’s current functions, if E Readers could also carry a calendar with event notifications, a calculator , and a way to make “ sticky notes ,” so that the user can jot quick things down right into the device, I would be thrilled! I don’t want it to be able to run games, make phone calls, play music, or videos, as these features would no longer make it a strictly academic device, and would open up all kinds of potential problems (like kids really watching youtube videos instead of reading at their desk.) If students want to check their email, make a phone call, watch a video, or listen to a podcast, they can use one of their other devices to do so. Hopefully my ideas have already been thought of by the E Reader companies, and they are hard at work creating the features necessary to **turn E Readers into personal academic organizers**. <span style="color: #808000; font-family: 'Comic Sans MS',cursive; font-size: 150%;">For additional reading about the latest news in E Readers, <span style="color: #ff0006; font-family: 'Comic Sans MS',cursive; font-size: 150%;"><span style="color: #808000; font-family: 'Comic Sans MS',cursive; font-size: 150%;">check out <span style="color: #ff0006; font-family: 'Comic Sans MS',cursive; font-size: 170%;">mobileread.com