Last Updated August 30, 2010
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Transformative new publishing model gaining traction with faculty, students, authors
Flat World Knowledge (www.flatworldknowledge.com), the leading publisher of commercial, openly-licensed college textbooks, reports that this fall semester, more than 800 colleges will utilize Flat World textbooks, up from 400 in the fall 2009 and up from 30 colleges in the spring 2009.
Flat World estimates their textbooks save the average student $80 per class, and projects its textbooks will save 150,000 students $12 million or more in textbook expenses for the 2010/2011 academic year.
Flat World's year-over-year growth is fueled by the company's innovative "free and open" textbook publishing model that allows students to acquire complete, high-quality, peer-reviewed textbooks at prices ranging from free for online access to only $30 for a softcover print book. Other formats include PDF downloads, audio and e-reader versions for the iPad and Kindle, as well as digital study aids.
"It's gratifying to see the tremendous response to our textbooks and publishing model across a wide range of academic institutions," said Jeff Shelstad, Flat World Knowledge CEO and co-founder. "By preserving what works from traditional publishing and changing everything that's broken, our open textbook publishing model is providing substantial benefits to students, faculty and authors."
For the 2010 fall semester, more than 1,300 educators representing 800 major state and private research universities and community college systems have adopted Flat World textbooks, including the University of Maryland, University of Texas, Carnegie Mellon University, multiple California State University campuses, the Foothill DeAnza Community College District in Calif., as well as institutions in Europe, Asia and the Middle East.
With a growing roster of top authors and more than 24 published titles and 50 more in the pipeline, Flat World expects to publish textbooks for the 125 highest-enrollment college courses in the next few years. New subjects in the immediate pipeline include algebra, psychology, chemistry, statistics and English composition.
Flat World's approach begins by keeping what works in traditional publishing. The company signs top scholars and successful authors to write exclusive, high-quality textbooks using industry-tested product development best practices.
But instead of adopting the industry-standard "all rights reserved" copyright license, Flat World publishes under an open Creative Commons license. The open license, combined with a highly-automated publishing platform that keeps costs low, transforms a static text into a dynamic learning resource that is automatically available in multiple low cost formats.
"The future is about creating better value, not making it more cumbersome and expensive for students," said Kyle Blake, a returning business student at Minnesota State University Moorhead. "Flat World understands that students want to be treated as consumers who deserve really good books in any format they wish."
While many students take advantage of the free online option, more than 50 percent purchase a physical book or other format that fits their individual learning style. To date, the most popular choice is a black-and-white softcover book for $30 -- significantly less than most textbooks. Online and interactive digital study aids are also top-sellers at $1.99 per chapter or $14.95 for a subscription.
Softcover books are printed on demand and sold directly to students or through their campus bookstore, minimizing conventional manufacturing and inventory costs.
Flat World has agreements with Barnes & Noble College Booksellers, Follett Higher Education Group, and NACS Media Solutions to distribute their open textbooks to more than 3,000 college stores across the US.
The company anticipates that more of its sales will transition from print to various digital formats over the next few years.
Since publishing its first commercially available books in 2009, Flat World reports that one third of its faculty adopters have used the online platform and customization tools to modify their textbooks to reflect their individual approach to their subject -- something they can't do with a conventional text. The open license approach gives them freedom to reuse, revise, remix and redistribute the book -- the 4 R's that define open -- so long as they attribute the author and publisher and don't engage in commercial activity.
Flat Word anticipates that 50 percent or more of faculty will customize their textbooks by the fall 2011 semester. This growth in faculty customization will follow the release of enhanced customization tools later this year. Faculty will be able to edit at the sentence level, creating the potential for a richer learning experience for both students and educators.
This semester, Dr. Scott Hunt, professor of economics at Columbus State Community College, and his colleagues created their own version of Principles of Macroeconomics by rearranging content and writing new sections.
"In all the years I've been a professor, we've never had the perfect book," said Dr. Scott Hunt, professor. "Now we do, and it's affordable."
Many authors have been hurt by the textbook industry's current business model. Royalties are dwindling from fewer new book sales. And non-royalty-paying used book sales, book rentals and online piracy sites take a greater share of the market. Authors also face internal competition with titles in their discipline from the same publisher.
Flat World is attracting top scholars and best-selling authors by offering a different experience: a new model that allows for faster market entry and a better royalty rate for a bigger return over time combined with a rigorous editorial development process and sales and marketing support. Flat World authors earn 20 percent royalties (the standard is 12 to 15 percent) on all revenue generated around their work, in all channels, sold anywhere in the world. In the open model, authors can benefit from a consistent revenue stream over time since sales don't drop off dramatically after the first year due to used books sales and rentals.
"I have full confidence in this model because it makes so much sense for students, faculty and authors," says Steve Barkan, professor of sociology at the University of Maine and author of Sociology: Understanding & Changing the Social World, soon-to-be published by Flat World. "Students, many of whom work part-time jobs, can finally get low-cost access to knowledge. As an author, I feel good about 'doing the right thing' and I stand to be well-compensated for years to come."
A sustainable model for the future of publishing
While the textbook publishing industry struggles to adapt to the Internet's impact on the way learning materials are consumed, Flat World has seized on the opportunity to bridge the value gap with a sustainable and profitable revenue model for publishing in the 21st century.
"The future of textbooks is all about choice," said CEO Shelstad. "By giving educators and students high-quality, affordable choices, Flat World Knowledge is helping thousands of students gain access to the education and knowledge they need to realize their potential and succeed in the global economy."
Virginia State University, Flat World Knowledge sign textbook licensing agreement
Virginia State University's Reginald F. Lewis School of Business today announced a groundbreaking textbook licensing agreement with Flat World Knowledge, a leading publisher of commercial, openly-licensed college textbooks. As part of a broad initiative to deliver an integrated core business curriculum to all its students, the business school has purchased a digital site license for Flat World textbooks that's cost-effective, environmentally sustainable and attuned to the demands of an increasingly mobile generation.
The agreement will also play a key role in the business school's "revolution of excellence" goal to increase retention and graduation rates at the historically black university through technology-based solutions. The Flat World agreement removes textbook costs as a barrier to higher education. Many conventional textbooks cost more than $200, and students often spend $1,000 or more per year on textbooks. The cost of textbooks is also a major reason that many students drop out of college, according to a Public Agenda research report for the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation.
"We are in the business of education and must seek innovative ways to ensure the success of our students, especially during these times of severe budget cuts and economic uncertainty," said Dr. Keith T. Miller, VSU President. "The licensing agreement with Flat World Knowledge meets the needs of our business students and faculty for high-quality, affordable textbooks, and serves as a model for how academic institutions and innovative publishers can partner to solve critical higher education issues."
Under the agreement, VSU will purchase seat licenses for students enrolled in eight courses in the core business curriculum. More courses will be added next year. Each site license will cost VSU $20 per student per course for digital access to all learning content for the core business curriculum, while preserving affordable print options for students.
The licensing model approaches textbooks as intellectual property that can be delivered in a variety of formats for greater convenience and at a more affordable price. VSU students and faculty will have choices to access and use the texts in ways that aren't possible with conventional textbooks sold under a traditional publishing business model.
Students, faculty benefit from format choices, content control
Students can read their textbooks in the format that best fits their individual learning style. The pre-paid license includes web, PDF, audio and e-reader versions for the iPad, Kindle and other e-readers. Online and interactive study aids are also included. Students with print disabilities will have access to the texts in DAISY (Digital Accessible Information System) and BRF (Braille Ready Format) formats.
The digital files do not have an expiration date nor are they encumbered with digital rights management (DRM) copy-protection, giving students unprecedented freedom to transfer the content from device to device for as long as they wish, even after they graduate. For students who prefer a physical book, softcover textbooks will also be available to VSU students for $30.
VSU faculty will benefit from Flat World's open Creative Commons license, which unlike an "all rights reserved" copyright license, transfers control of the content to faculty. Flat World provides a suite of online editing tools that makes it easy for faculty to customize and tailor a textbook to meet their individual teaching goals.
VSU students can save more than $900 per year
While the university is covering the initial roll-out costs, going forward VSU will explore various options to transfer the license costs to students. Depending on their course load, VSU estimates that students could save $900 or more per year on textbooks.
"Less than 50 percent of our students buy textbooks because they can't afford them, and this causes students to fall behind," said Dr. Mirta Martin, dean of VSU's School of Business. "Through this licensing model we hope to break that cycle, improve retention and graduation rates, and create a pipeline of student success. Our students have always had the ability and intellect, now they will have the resources."
"The economics of textbooks is hurting students, faculty, institutions and authors," said Eric Frank, president and co-founder of Flat World Knowledge. "This new model lowers the cost barrier to college, increases choices for students, and gives faculty more control over the content they use in their classes. This new approach to textbook publishing also provides authors an opportunity to earn fair compensation for their hard work. And it points the way to a sustainable revenue model for a new publisher in the 21st century."
College e-textbook market to grow 50% in 2010, new Simba Report finds
E-textbooks are finding their legs in the college market, growing at an estimated compound annual growth rate of nearly 49% through 2013, when they will account for more than 11% of textbook sales, according to the newly released "E-Textbooks in Higher Education" report from media industry forecast and analysis firm Simba Information.
"The digital transformation has infused new dynamism in the college publishing industry in the past year," said Kathy Mickey, senior analyst/managing editor of Simba's Education Group. "In the throes of a struggling economy, new devices and new formats have roiled the pot. Students, instructors and publishers are experimenting with the way textbooks and other instructional materials are created, marketed, distributed and used."
New print textbooks continue to dominate the college instructional materials market at a projected $4.46 billion in 2010. But the hard-charging e-textbook segment will grow about 50% to an estimated $181 million, according to Simba's most recent strategic market report.
"E-Textbooks in Higher Education" provides insight into:
- The quickly changing distribution models for college instructional materials;
- The role of learning management systems in marketing and distribution;
- The disruptive potential of open access materials and textbook rental programs on e-textbook segment growth.
One focus of "E-Textbooks in Higher Education" is a Simba analysis of the lessons learned from the series of e-reader pilot programs in the 2009-2010 academic year. "A sure sign of how willing instructors and students are to experiment with new ways of accessing textbooks they need is the spate of pilot programs for Apple's iPad, even after the tepid reception to the Kindle DX on campuses," Mickey said.
An appendix to the report offers an overview of e-book format evolution and methods used by consumers to view and purchase e-books — an additional tool for publishers, marketers and business development professionals in understanding market needs, trends and challenges.
Additional information about the report, and how to order it, can be found at
www.simbainformation.com
Two classes of works not subject to DMCA protection benefit educators, authors
Two of the six classes of works determined by U.S. Copyright Librarian of Congress James H. Billington as not being subject to Digital Millennium Copyright Act (DMCA) provisions that would make it unlawful to attempt to break or bypass their technological copy protection schemes, are of particular interest to educators and authors, said attorney Stephen E. Gillen, of Wood, Herron & Evans L.L.P.
Those two classes of works include, he says:
1 — Video programs protected by the Content Scrambling System (CSS). The Librarian has continued and expanded the exception for educational fair use of video programs protected by CSS. It is not a violation of the DMCA anticircumvention provisions for educators and students to disable or bypass CSS to extract excerpts from copyrighted DVDs for any educational use that would qualify as a fair use.
2 -- Literary works distributed as e-books with access controls that disable read-aloud or screen-reader functions. The Librarian has continued the exception for these literary works. It is not a violation of the DMCA anticircumvention provision to bypass those access controls in order to provide access to the protected content for the visually impaired.
“These are narrow but important exceptions to potent protective legislation,” said Gillen. “But they are limited to particularly defined circumstances and they are also limited in time -- the exceptions are granted for the three-year rule making period and revisited and reviewed every three years.”
Billington’s determinations are a result of a 2009 rulemaking proceeding, which the DMCA requires the Librarian of Congress and the Copyright Office (in conjunction with other agencies) to engage in every three years as a way to consider and identify classes of works that should be exempted from the anticircumvention provisions of the DMCA that interfere with lawful access or use.
The rulemaking proceeding is public and interested parties can petition to have classes added or expanded or they can oppose addition or expansion.
View Billington’s full statement: click here
'Virtual book' on Google Seminar Series from CCC
The Copyright Clearance Center (CCC) is offering a “virtual book” that gathers together the transcripts from six of its programs on the proposed class action settlement between Google, the Authors Guild and the Association of American Publishers. The programs were presented from April 2009 to February 2010 and featuring Lois Wasoff, Esq.
All the original interview programs remain available for listening at copyright.com.
Support for Summer Writers: Lower Your Standards
By Kerry Ann Rockquemore
 Kerry Ann Rockquemore |
The middle of the summer has a way of throwing many writers into a panic. Even the most diligent academic writers who have formulated a summer plan, created support and accountability mechanisms, developed a relationship with their bodyguard, and are dedicated to daily writing, can feel the summer slipping away. There’s just something that sets in after the July 4th weekend that makes those long summer months start to look more like weeks. As a result, the first week of July is a time when many of us begin to realize that: 1) academic writing is a very slow process, 2) the brilliant ideas we started the summer with may not be quite as groundbreaking as we imagined, 3) we have grossly underestimated the amount of time our summer projects will take to complete and 4) our summer plans may need some downward revision.
The combination of these various realizations can leave dedicated summer writers feeling frustrated and the procrastinators (who haven’t yet started their writing) hesitant to begin. I want to encourage you to keep observing and working with your resistance to writing this summer. Last week, I described surface-level resistance: when you know you should write, but you’re just not putting any energy into doing it. This week, I want to start discussing the deeper levels of resistance that get triggered by the physical act of writing.
The broad array of behavioral tips and tricks I’ve described in previous columns will get most people to the computer, but actually writing is a different ballgame. In fact, for many academic writers, sitting down each day to write is tremendously anxiety-provoking. So much so that our inner bodyguard springs up to protect us in the form of procrastination, avoidance, and/or denial. I have worked with thousands of academics, and the most common demons that underlie resistance to writing are: 1) unrealistically high expectations, 2) disempowerment, 3) a hyperactive inner critic, 4) unclear goals, and/or 5) a fear of success (or failure). I’m going to exorcise each of these demons one by one this summer in a way that encourages conscious reflection on each one. I’m also going to suggest some concrete strategies that I’ve seen writers use effectively to release the anxiety-producing elements and respond in a way that reduces resistance so you can move forward in your writing.
Examining Your Expectations
High expectations are tricky. On the one hand, if you're reading this column, you've already experienced tremendous educational success and that is likely tied to having high expectations for yourself. On the other hand, when our expectations about who we should be, how we should feel, what we should achieve, and the impact our work should have in the world are too high, unexamined, inappropriate for our current career stage, or generated from a desperate need to prove ourselves, they become a straitjacket. I’ve seen high expectations manifest in a variety of ways among academics, including:
Super-Professor: There are so many roles that I must perform perfectly NOW! I want to be a cutting-edge researcher, institutional change agent, transformative teacher, inspiring role model, community activist, and public intellectual all at the same time. Regrettably, I’m so busy running around trying to do all of these things simultaneously that I’m not accomplishing much of anything.
Instantaneous Superstar: My first book must be a discipline-shifting magnum opus! Unfortunately, I can’t actually get any words on paper because my initial attempts at a first draft feel feeble, small, and incompetent when compared to the brilliant, flawless, and award winning book I imagine producing.
Super-Mom/Dad: My standard of parenting is so high that I’m perpetually exhausted (particularly in the summer months). As a result of my perfect parenting standards, I have difficulty carving out time to write during the summer and experience debilitating guilt when taking time for my writing (or myself).
Maybe these sound familiar, and I’m sure you could come up with more examples of high expectations run amok. Let’s be clear, I’m not writing this column to judge anyone. Instead, I’m describing these examples because if you suffer from the kind of high expectations that induce writing paralysis, guilt, shame, or feeling not good enough, smart enough, or dedicated enough, then I want you to consider trying one of the strategies described below. At a minimum, they will provide you with ideas about how to identify immobilizing expectations, release the unhealthy components and respond in a way that gets you back to daily writing.
Strategy 1: Rethink Your Career as a Book With Many Chapters
Take 30 minutes of time to journal about your career from a long-term perspective. In other words, instead of feeling that you have to do everything all at once, imagine that your career is literally a book with many chapters. Each chapter represents a five-year span of time in which one type of activity is front and center. Imagine that there’s one big goal for each chapter (the title) that serves as the guiding force for your professional activities. If you’re on the tenure track, Chapter One is going to be entitled Research and Writing. But the later chapters can focus on becoming a master teacher, working as a public intellectual, engaging in activism for social change, creating organizational change at your particular institution, or whatever is important to you. This type of reflection about your career over the long run often frees early-career academics from a sense of having to do everything now, and instead allows you to imagine your goals as unfolding over the length of your career.
Strategy 2: Develop a Metaphor to Understand Your Writing Process
Unrealistic expectations for the production of writing often emerge from a lack of awareness of the length, depth, and oscillations of our own writing process. I used to be in a writing group with a political scientist named Michelle Boyd who described writing as birthing. She developed an elaborate metaphor in which each stage of pregnancy (from conception to birth) had a parallel to her writing process. Fully developing this metaphor required an awareness of her own process, the time frames in which her writing occurred, and the desire to understand how her writing unfolds over time. The benefit to developing your own metaphor is that it enables you to release yourself from the idea of producing a perfect first draft (because that’s just not how anyone’s process really works). Instead you learn to understand how you move from a new idea to a complete manuscript so that you can appreciate your ideas when they are in the fragile and unformed early stages, nurture them along through revision, share them regularly with others, and watch them grow into mature and polished manuscripts.
Strategy #3: Create a 0 – 100 Percent Reviewer List
One of the best ways to keep unrealistically high expectations from paralyzing your writing is to share your work throughout the writing process. At any given time, I understand my own manuscripts as somewhere between 0-25 percent, 25–50 percent, 50-75 percent, or 75-100 percent complete. I keep a corresponding list of reviewers for each stage. For example, when a manuscript is 0-25% complete, I ask a particular group of people (my husband, my writing group, and my long-standing graduate school friends) to read it and provide quick feedback about the central idea. If a manuscript is 75-100 percent complete, then I send it to a different group of readers (people who are experts in my subfield) for more comprehensive feedback. The key is to avoid holding onto manuscripts until they are almost complete before you request feedback. Waiting until something is “perfect” only heightens anxiety and encourages over-investment, over-attachment and holding onto manuscripts too long. Instead, you want to continually share your work with trusted readers and ask for feedback that is appropriate to the stage it is in. Get comfortable saying things like: "Can you read this in the next week? It's at 25 percent and I just want to know what you think about the idea." Doing so will help you to hold expectations that accurately correspond to your manuscript’s stage of development.
Strategy #4: Experiment With Lowering Your Expectations
One of the homework assignments I give my Faculty Success Program participants is to lower one of their standards every day for a week. The only rule is that they can’t lower their standards in the areas of research, writing, or personal care. But everything else is fair game: summer course preparation, household cleanliness, e-mail responsiveness, etc…, It’s amazing what happens when high achievers try lowering their standards each day. If you regularly operate with uniformly high standards across every area of your life, then lowering your standards and learning how to make conscious decisions about when and where to invest your best time and energy can feel positively liberating! Most of the time nobody even notices and you will increase the time you have available for the things that really matter.
Weekly Challenge
This week I challenge you to:
- Write every day for 30-60 minutes.
- If you find yourself procrastinating or avoiding your writing, patiently ask yourself: What’s going on? What are my expectations? And what am I afraid of?
- If your resistance to writing is driven by unrealistically high standards, try journaling about your career as a book with many chapters, or developing a metaphor for your writing.
- Expand your sense of the writing process to include ongoing feedback and conversation with others by creating a 0-100% reviewer list.
- Try adjusting how you approach your first drafts from perfectionist judgment to compassion by treating your initial writing with the same loving gentleness you would give to a baby, a puppy, a seedling, or whatever is small and fragile but will grow into something big and strong.
- Lower one standard each day this week (other than writing and self care) and see what happens.
- Try reading Peg Boyle’s excellent series on Procrastination and Perfectionism in order to better understand these issues. (http://www.insidehighered.com/advice/dissertation/single12 and http://www.insidehighereducation.com/advice/dissertation/single10)
- If you’re completely lost and have no idea what you’re doing, read Wendy Belcher’s Writing Your Journal Article in 12 Weeks: A Guide to Academic Publishing Success – it will provide you with a framework, process, and timeline for moving from idea to complete draft.
I hope this week brings you new insights on how your resistance works, the freedom that comes from lowering your standards to appropriate and achievable levels, and forward movement on your summer writing project.
Read Rockquemore’s latest Support for Summer Writers, “Writing IS Thinking” (http://www.insidehighered.com/advice/summer/summer6)
Purple Dragonfly Book Awards accepting nominations
Five Star Publications is accepting nominations for its Purple Dragonfly Book Awards, which recognize and honor accomplished authors in the field of children’s literature. The awards are divided into 19 subject categories ranging from the environment to sports and family issues. Deadline for submissions is July 14, 2010. Submit an entry form at www.purpledragonflybookawards.com
blogtalkradio: TAA Podcast Series, "State of the Textbook Indexing World"
You might take that alphabetized list of words and page numbers for granted, but there's turmoil inside the textbook indexing world. First there's the ongoing challenge of people not understanding what indexing is about, a world where production editors are always just out of college, authors are forced to pay, and jobs are going to countries where English isn't a first language. The rise of e-books has reintroduced a significant problem that first appeared in the early 1990s: wholly inferior tools. E-book indexes do not work, literally. How does this affect writing? Join us on Wednesday, August 25 at 11 a.m. EST for a lively discussion with Seth Maislin, Managing Partner at Potomac Indexing, LLC (www.potomacindexing.com), about how we find things...or not.
Visit TAA's blogtalkradio page, listen to archived podcasts and set a reminder for upcoming podcasts: Click here
Authors Guild warns Bloomberg authors not to sign Wiley letter
The Authors Guild "strongly urges" Bloomberg Press authors not to sign a letter from John Wiley & Sons, which acquired Bloomberg in March, that outlines changes in Wiley's accounting systems that the Guild said "will materially and adversely affect the royalty rates of many Bloomberg Press authors."
The Guild, in a notice to members on its website, said that while the letter "sounds innocent enough, it isn't" and if signed, will serve as a contract amendment that could "effectively slice royalties by up to 50% for some book sales."
CA bill aimed at ensuring TX standards don't show up in CA textbooks
The California Senate approved legislation that requires the state's Board of Education to watch for any Texas social studies content when reviewing public school textbooks. The bill (SB1451), introduced by Senator Leland Yee, D-San Francisco, will now go in front of the California Assembly, and if passed, will need to be signed by California Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger.
Textbook Publishing in the Digital Age
On his xplana blog, Rob Reynolds gives an overview of the textbook publishing industry and current business models and explores opportunities for the future of textbook publishing with his post, "The Transformation of Textbook Publishing in the Digital Age — New Business Models."
Read Reynolds's report, "Digital Textbook Sales in U.S. Higher Education — A Five-Year Projection," which outlines e-textbook sales over the next five years based on current trends and variables.
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