I keep thinking about the discussion that ensued from that article in the Chronicle, and it really reminds me of the situation with online courses. Many people did, and still do, struggle to replicate classroom classes online... and that does not go well: the whole idea is that the online space is different, with different learning activities that go well there (a wider range of learning activities than in the classroom IMO). Well, it seems much the same with online content: books are great when you hold them in your hands, but for digital, we need to be thinking about content in new ways. That goes for any kind of reading, but even more so for textbooks. I never used a textbook myself; even for language learning, I was not happy with the textbook model... and that was before I was even teaching online! So, surely the online world should give us a chance to do something different from textbooks and, ideally, something better -- far better! -- than traditional textbooks. But if traditional textbooks are how people think and how they design their courses, it is going to be hard to make that change.
For example, I'm frustrated that there is not already some kind of "mixer" model out there already for what I want to do with the Tale Spinner. I can kludge something together with a blog or maybe at Diigo, but it's frustrating to find myself here in 2019 without the right tool. Lists of links are surely not the answer and while I am ultimately excited to create some books (just because I love books and many people still enjoy books!), I really do not think that books are the right answer for educational settings... unless, that is, students are creating their own books!
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