Friend insisted the iPad would kill physical textbooks by 2015

My buddy was at an Apple keynote in 2010 and came back 100% sure printed books were dead within 5 years. He claimed every college would go digital by 2013 and paper would be obsolete. I just found a picture of his iPad 2 from 2012 with a cracked screen and a stack of actual textbooks next to it. We talked about it last week and he laughed because his kid still uses a $40 used physics book from 2019. The only thing that really died was his iPad battery after 2 years. Anyone else remember those early 2010s predictions that never panned out?

2 comments

2 Comments

olivias8812d ago

You gotta admit e-textbooks have taken over in a lot of grad programs though, my sister barely touches physical books anymore for her med stuff. Plus that dead iPad battery was probably more about early tech being unreliable than the whole idea being wrong.

seanperry12d ago

People were so sure paper was done but here we are in 2025 with textbooks still piling up. That iPad 2 battery dying before any real change happened pretty much sums it up. Felt like a lot of tech predictions back then were more wishful thinking than actual reality.

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