Apple's New iBooks 2, iBooks Author Apps Hit 440,000 Downloads Combined in First 3 Days

About 350,000 textbooks were downloaded from the iBooks 2 store while iBooks Author had 90,000 downloads

Just last week, Apple unveiled its efforts to reinvent the textbook via two new apps called iBook Author and iBooks 2, and both have gained significant popularity in their short time since release.

IBook Author and iBooks 2 launched January 19 at Apple's education event at the Guggenheim Museum in New York City. IBook Author is Mac software that allows textbook writers and publishers to create textbooks specifically for the iPad while iBooks 2 is a sequel to the iBooks app that provides students with textbooks on the iPad as well as new study options like note-taking.

Global Equities Research, which provides research in global equities with a focus on near-term to long-term trends, has been keeping its eye on Apple's latest educational offerings via a proprietary tracking system. According to its findings, Apple's two new apps are already a huge hit.

Global Equities Research's tracking system determined that there were 90,000 downloads of iBooks Author within the first three days of availability while 350,000 textbooks were downloaded from the iBooks store within that same period of time.

The new textbook apps seem to be a winner for all parties involved, since iBook production costs about 80 percent less than print publication according to Global Equities Research. With supply chain markup on textbooks between 33 and 35 percent, cutting out the middlemen between the publisher to the retailer and instead delivering digital textbooks from the publisher to the student via iBooks will present considerable savings.

The textbooks in iBooks 2 are high school level books that are starting at $14.99 or less for now. These prices will increase over time as the selection expands. The books offered in the free app come from publishers like Pearson, McGraw Hill and Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, which combined make up 90 percent of textbooks available.

Apple halts store sales of iPhones in Bejing and China, following disturbance

Following a disturbance at one of its stores in Beijing this morning, Apple has announced it has put a halt to all iPhone sales in its Beijing and Shanghai stores, “for the time being”. The devices will still be available, as before, via the carrier - China Unicom, other retail stores, and Apple’s online store.

The disturbance this morning was caused by a 500-strong crowd at the Sanlitun store in Beijing, where people had stood in line for hours in sub-zero temperatures, awaiting the launch of theiPhone 4S. The store did not open when it was supposed to, at 7AM, and the crowd became unruly, with some members even throwing eggs when they were informed that there would be no sales of iPhone 4S that day because of shortages.

The store was cordoned off, while the crowd was cleared by police. The store never did open however, and company later issued a statement, saying it was because of “the large crowd, and to ensure the safety of our customers and employees".

Elsewhere, one Shanghai store opened early, hoping to minimize problems at launch, but instead ended creating a lot of disappointment, amidst those people who arrived ‘on time’ to find the device sold out. Apart from these two incidents, no trouble was reported at any of Apple’s other Beijing and Shanghai stores, so it is perhaps surprising Apple made the announcement to stop iPhone sales in these cities.

The official reason for the halting of sales has not been given, though if the halt was not called because of the disturbances, but because of an iPhone 4S shortage, it would make no sense for Apple to have stopped sales of all iPhone devices.

The crowd outside the Apple Store at Sanlitun has faced problems in the past, when a crowd waiting to buy the iPad 2 turned unruly, evening breaking the glass of store, and causing some injuries to bystanders. Apple has faced other problems in the recent past with the launch of its devices, with resellers purchasing most of the devices on launch day, and selling them at exorbitant mark-ups.

At today’s fracas at Sanlibun, nearly 60 migrant workers were spotted, most hired by resellers to stand in line and buy the devices. According to reports, these workers were perhaps the most disappointed in the unruly crowd, as they would not be able to collect their fee.

China is Apple’s second biggest market for mobile devices, with the company’s products evidently very popular there. Maybe next time, Apple could price the devices in China as high as India, to prevent any such incidents.