Apple to give retail employees free iBooks to prep for Mavericks, iOS 7 push

Announced at Apple Retail’s store quarterly meetings today, Apple will begin providing its employees free iBooks titles next week. The initiative is called “iBooks Discovery” internally.

The move comes ahead of the launch of both OS X Mavericks and iOS 7. Mavericks will be the first Mac operating system to feature the iBooks app and iBookstore, so Apple is providing their employees paid titles for free as a way for the employees to further familiarize themselves with iBooks. This, in turn, will allow the employees to be more experienced with iBooks as they introduce the Apple book reading service to Mac users for the first time.

As for iOS 7, the new operating system sports a completely redesigned look, and Apple, in the internal quarterly store meetings, foreshadowed an iBooks for iOS redesign by showing the app’s iOS 7 icon…

This icon was previously found inside of beta versions of iOS 7 for developers. Apple previously launched a similar employee program for App Store apps, called Apps Discovery, in a push for its retail employees to become more familiar with the apps available on the App Store. For this program, Apple gave employees paid apps for free that are already available on Apple Store iOS Device demo units. It seems plausible that Apple will pick similarly applicable iBooks titles for the new program.

Other current Apple Retail pushes include work to sell more iPhones, and a new Apple Store app. Apple released an update to this app last week, and sources say that it creates a foundation for Apple to begin seeding free iTunes and Apps content to customers in-store running the app. Apple has also provided its retail employees with early access to both OS X Mavericks and the upcoming iWork for iCloud beta. As for iOS 7, the new OS is mostly off-limits for Apple’s retail employees.