Will the Apple iPad let you read textbooks?

[Satterthwaite]

If so the iPad would be a must have for college students. Being able to download a digital format of these books that you pay an arm and a leg for would save you hundreds of dollars. I know that the iPad is probably capable of reading them it is probably just a matter of the publishers allowing rights for Apple to do that.

I would be really interested to learn more if anyone has heard anything about this.


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[Alli]

There's an entire thread on this very topic. Bottom line - right now the majority of publishers are not selling textbooks in digital format. Many that are, merely give you digital rights when you purchase (at full cost) the physical text. Of what's available now, it's mostly just .pdf format.

 

[Alli]

For reading purpose, I think you should definitely go for the Kindle instead of iPad. iBookStore is too unmature at this moment. See a discussion here on Apple's official discussion forum:

Dear Sir Spamalot, er, Mallory,

Why you would recommend against an Apple product and then point to an Apple discussion on the topic? And then leave out the link?