One of my readings for the class I’m taking is available as an ebook, but there’s some sort of copyright protection preventing me from easily sharing passages on social media, saving passages to my GoodReads account, or seeing other students’ highlights.
I love the social features of an ereader, especially discovering the best-loved passages of my favorite novels, just as a person who loves to read. If you work in education, and read a great deal about technology and education, then you often hear the acronym PLN for Personal Learning Network, and most of my PLN gets pretty excited over new ways to reach students through social media, new ways to share what we’re reading, new ways to share our thoughts, new content to discover, and new ways to participate in an exchange of ideas. You guys, we’re so close to a magical future utopia of easily accessible learning communities for all different interests!
So, it blows my mind that now, when I’m in an online course where part of my grade is proving that I’ve done assigned reading and another part is having online discussions with other students about the text, that the social features of the ebook would be disabled.
It’s a particularly poor copyright protection since I’m forcibly prevented from putting a meaningful passage on my GoodReads account, but there’s only my conscience to stop me from screenshotting the entire reading.
