Apple will sell e-textbooks designed to run on iPads.
Apple unveiled a new version of its iBooks digital book software that supports textbooks featuring quizzes, note-taking, study cards and other features like the ability to interact with a diagram of an ant.
The service will launch with a small number of high-school titles from McGraw-Hill Cos., Pearson PLC and Houghton Mifflin Harcourt. Textbooks for courses such as algebra 1, environmental science and biology will be available first, priced at $14.99 or less. Eventually, Apple said, it expects textbooks for almost every subject and grade level. The company also announced iBooks Author, to help developers create interactive titles.
In a media event held at New York’s Guggenheim Museum, Apple executives said textbooks should be portable, searchable, easy to update and provide immediate feedback.
