Digital Textbooks to Complement Your Online Education

We’ve written about a variety of learning tools that have been popping up on the web in recent months from institutional examples like Academic Earth and iTunes University to more grassroots models like Moontoast and the School of Everything, causing us to rethink the ways we view the availability and cost of education. And while these online alternatives are freeing knowledge from the confines of the classroom, we’re not ready to call traditional college educations obsolete, for the time being at least. Which is why we were particularly excited by Flat World Knowledge, a company that hopes to revolutionize higher learning by providing open source textbooks online for free.

In addition to the web-only versions, the company is offering a number of fee-based options at significantly reduced prices. Students will be able to purchase black & white softcover editions for $29 and individual pdf’s of chapters for $1.99 that they can then print on their own, along with audio versions and additional study materials. But beyond the bottom line savings, what really makes this model noteworthy are the customizable features – in the summer of 2009, instructors will be able to edit the texts at the sentence level, specifically tailoring them to their courses – and the ability to integrate these materials into existing learning management systems. This service also includes social networking capabilities, allowing students to interact with one another while virtually taking and sharing notes.

[via ReadWriteWeb]