The Feasibility of E-Ink Readers in Distance Learning: A Field Study

Abstract

â?? E-book readers based on E-ink mimic paper very closely and are an emerging technology. Despite the slow acceptance of this novel technology, The Open University of the Netherlands (OU) is preparing to offer study material for this new medium. This paper reports the first experiences with the introduction of the new technology, both from a content producerâ??s perspective as well as from a consumerâ??s viewpoint. As it turned out, a significant amount of effort had to be spent on reformatting the already available A4 sized standard study material to accommodate the small 6â??â?? screen sizes of todayâ??s E-ink readers. Our experience suggests that the classic A4 study material production process has to be replaced by a media-agnostic process, allowing for a flexible formatting and sizing of the content at the end of the process. In addition, since much of the content originates from external publishers, their â??reformatting