O’Reilly Press
Just got back from the JavaOne Conference in San Francisco. There’s a whole lot going on in the world of Java. However, I was struck by the Exhibitors Pavilion and in particular, the O’Reilly booth. While there were a lot of text book companies present, O’Reilly was the only one that seemed to be pushing it’s eLearning options.
At O’Reilly, an instructor/trainer can choose a customized book, arrange for that book to appear on O’Reilly’s SafariU, and use the SafariU LMS to teach the class online or in a blended learning environment.
This is great for many reasons:
1. The book is customized, meaning that students need only buy one book instead of several. The instructor can mix and match from the O’Reilly titles.
2. The book is then available in a PDF format, for the students to view online or print portions (or in its entirety).
3. There is no fee to the Instructor. O’Reilly’s model is to charge the students, just as if they were buying a paper-based textbook.
This is a great model, I believe, and I wish more publishing houses would see the advantages of the customized books.
