In a classroom environment, several students could collaborate, post notes, and add information at any time to an infobase the entire class has access to or work on personal shadow files of an infobase. In addition, the program supports an unlimited number of simultaneous users in read-only mode. An electronic book or infobase would thus support much more interactivity than a traditional book, especially in a networked computing environment. The disadvantage, of course, would be that the infobase is not as portable as a traditional print book. It cannot be read on the bus from campus to apartment, for example.
Electronic books are also more fluid than traditional books.
Traditionally, an edition of a printed textbook may be used for three to seven years. A mistake or error in a book with a first print run of 10,000 copies is likely to be a problem for at least 10,000 readers. However, errors and weaknesses can be corrected as soon as they are discovered in electronic books. However, frequent updating can produce its own set of problems such as instructions about the location of information that no longer apply because revisions have shifted the location of information. The time from idea to final product may become much shorter, along with the useful lifespan of a particular edition.