Expensive Books Inspire P2P Textbook Downloads 511
jyosim writes "A site called Textbook Torrents is among the many sites popping up offering free downloads of expensive textbooks using BitTorrent or other peer-to-peer networks. With the average cost of textbooks going up every year, and with some books costing more than $100, some experts say that piracy will only increase." Having just completed graduate school, I can attest that quite a few books are in that more-than-$100 range, and that they're heavy besides. But the big-name textbook publishers are much less interested than I am in open textbooks, even if MIT has demonstrated that open courseware is feasible, and Stanford and other schools have put quite a bit of material on iTunes.
Library of Alexandria (Score:5, Funny)
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
In a way, political and legal earthquakes and mob burnings of free information sites are serving to strengthen the integrity and resiliency of a fast evolving Library of Alexandria, even if it is not yet labeled as such. One day such a data repository may also very well fit onto a key chain sized flash drive.
Dirty thieves (Score:5, Funny)
You are stealing from the pockets of the professors who change the text book every semester making your used book worthless.
Re:Dirty thieves (Score:5, Interesting)
I doubt he even made a profit on it, he seemed more interested in providing us a fairly inexpensive valuable learning tool. Too bad other professors couldn't be bothered.
Re:Dirty thieves (Score:5, Interesting)
You're lucky, then.
I had one professor that was too lazy to keep changing the book every year. He just wrote up some crappy software that was required to be able to do the coursework, then threatened an instant fail for anyone caught violating the software license by selling it along with the textbook. The only place to get a legal copy of the software was along with a new (very expensive) textbook.
Re:Dirty thieves (Score:4, Informative)
Re:Dirty thieves (Score:4, Interesting)
While the first sale doctrine may protect the sale, it doesn't oblige the professor to pretend it didn't happen. He's free to give the buyer any grade he wants or no grade at all, or at least it'll be a civil case based on any agreements between you and the institution and the institution and the professor. At least in the US I think the institution would cover their ass and say you got a grade as required, it's the professor's grade and that decision is final. I don't think there's any way you could force an institution to issue a grade, no matter how much you've deserved it...
Re: (Score:3, Informative)
Here in the US, many students feel that the tuition buys good grades, studying be damned. Classes have, in many but not all cases, been dumbed down for this very reason. Students (and their parents) have sued over and over again for grade increases AND WON, despite the fact they frequently didn't deserve the better grade. So, actually, the professor should be very afraid of a law suit, warranted or otherwise. Our universities still produce some great minds and great workers/creators/etc., but the grade
Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
What if the professor required sexual favors for a passing grade? I mean, it would obviously be grounds for dismal, but don't you think that's actionable? Isn't this in fact extortion?
Re:Dirty thieves (Score:5, Insightful)
that's what exam boards are for:
"Why does your class have a 90% fail rate?"
"I insta-fail anyone who doesn't buy my textbook"
"Erm, right. We're giving everyone a concessionary pass and giving this module to someone else next year."
OTOH, this is my 4th year in taught academia, and I have only just come across a lecturer who directly set questions from a textbook - I always used to chuckle when I saw references to textbook exercises being used directly. If you get to give feedback at the end of the module - make sure that everyone complains about being forced to buy the textbook. During the term, make sure to complain to anyone within earshot about it too.
Re:Dirty thieves (Score:5, Interesting)
Nowadays, most profs aren't allowed (by either law, Board of Regents ethics codes, or by school policy) to require their own authored textbooks for taking their own classes.
OTOH, this hasn't stopped a "scratch my back and I'll scratch yours" racket where two profs teaching the same subject in different schools or states will each require the other's authored textbook (at some pretty hefty prices) as part of the coursework.
(IIRC, it depends on locality, and some may have a limit on what they can charge otherwise for the things).
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
Nowadays, most profs aren't allowed (by either law, Board of Regents ethics codes, or by school policy) to require their own authored textbooks for taking their own classes.
[Citation Needed]
I took a course that used the prof's text book. The dept and/or university required him to donate the equivalent he would get in royalties. He was allowed to do this.
In my current university in a different state, another professor uses his own book as a textbook. Don't know if he has to donate anything or not, but he's been doing it for decades now.
Re:Dirty thieves (Score:5, Interesting)
Re: (Score:3, Funny)
He might indeed need that money. A cadillac ain't that great a car...
Now, if he was in a Porsche or high end BMW, well you might have room to bitch...
Re:Dirty thieves (Score:4, Interesting)
All course material was free and easily accessable on a modified version of ms exchange, which I can still access 1 year after leaving university. I used to recieve around 1000 pages of module information for every module and while every lecturer had a recommended reading list after the 1st year in University I noticed the free course material often went into greater depth and was better explained than the books I was paying £50 for. I am excluding information gained from classes when I say "course material".
Thats the Univeristy of Plymouth for anyone who's looking to study Electrical/Electronic/Computing/Communications Engineering. The lecturers there teach because they honestly have a passion for the subject and try to imprint it onto their students.
Re:Dirty thieves (Score:5, Insightful)
I had a Discrete Mathematics professor who did the same thing.
From TFA:
"It is troubling that there is a culture of infringement out there,"
It is more troubling that there is a culture of printing on dead trees with the explicit intent of making them obsolete before the ink dries to sell more of them.
Re:Dirty thieves (Score:5, Informative)
Academics often contribute to textbooks without being paid. I wrote a chapter for a textbook recently and am currently working on another, and I won't get any financial return for either - I consider it a part of my job. Having said that the books do turn out to be quite expensive, I put that down to the low numbers the publisher expects to sell.
Writers of very popular course books will get some return, but for most of us writing specialist texts this isn't the case.
Re:Dirty thieves (Score:5, Interesting)
Writers of very popular course books will get some return, but for most of us writing specialist texts this isn't the case.
So wouldn't it be better if specialists in the same field, perhaps from different universities, set up a public read limited write wiki site where articles on various topics of interest, sample problems, and other course and research related materials could be created and maintained by the community to the benefit of everyone including the students? The materials would be complete and up to date, or at least they could be, and the distribution costs would be minimal.
Slightly different idea...would you be interested? (Score:3, Interesting)
A few years ago I had an idea about this and Ive been waiting to see if it ever happened. Basically I thought maybe a consortium of universities around the world could organise a kind of "offical" wiki for say scientific work(doesnt matter what subject... lets say physics)
I've had the same idea, also for physics! However I could never get my colleagues interested enough in it to form a critical mass. Unlike the other efforts on the web I want a citizendium like approach: only qualified people can contribute to the Wiki. However, inspired by an idea from citizendium I've been toying with something slightly different.
Instead of profs writing the entries I was thinking of setting an assignment for the students to write parts of the text. The requirement being that the resu
Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
Academics often contribute to textbooks without being paid. I wrote a chapter for a textbook recently and am currently working on another, and I won't get any financial return for either
You might not get any financial return, but you will get popularity. Academic success is rated by the number of published papers, and referenced papers. Remember, 'publish or perish'.
BTW, if the site admin from the textbook torrents is reading, I found the following info interesting:
First, I swear to you that I will do everything in my power to prevent the server's logs from falling into the hands of those that might use them against you.
What he should do is remove the logs. Remo
Re:Dirty thieves (Score:4, Interesting)
That's an interesting point, and the answer is I don't know. I suppose the job of the publisher or maybe the editors in that regard is to identify the need for the book, decide on the contents, to identify suitable authors and to make sure the whole book makes narrative sense. They then ask the authors to contribute their chapters. The authors and their parent institutions then get their names and perhaps more importantly their points of view published and read.
Of course there was nothing to stop me writing my chapters on my own and self publishing them, but there would be no guarantee they would ever be read, and quite simply without being asked it would never have occurred to me to do it.
Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
There are actually Creative Commons projects focused on providing free textbook materials on lots of subjects. If you contributed to such a project, the project coordinators would take on the role of the publisher, without gouging their clients.
Thanks I'll look into it, and then try to persuade my boss that it's a worthwhile use of my time.
Don't cheat the students! (Score:5, Funny)
Re:Don't cheat the students! (Score:5, Funny)
Where would we be if our students didn't understand the latest developments in trigonometry or first-semester calculus?
answer: where we are right now.
Re: (Score:3, Funny)
Re:Dirty thieves (Score:5, Informative)
Changing editions every few years is something done by the publishers. I know, I used to work very closely with the local (independent) college bookstore. We would specifically try to get used copies of books that professors request, because it would be cheaper for students (and undercut the corporate-owned bookstore down the street), and only then resort to new. But, when a publisher changed the edition, the used market for that book would dry up. I don't know where all the old copies went, but usually we couldn't even find them.
Re:Dirty thieves (Score:4, Interesting)
Mainly because the sale price of the used book if no colleges are using them quickly drops $1 or so. Someone might have this used book, they check to see the going price, its only $1, they shelve it and forget about it forever.
I wonder if there is a business to be made on that kinda stuff. Posting a list of all the books you have then letting you know when the going price for that book goes up or there is someone wanting the book who can't find it.
Re: (Score:3, Funny)
I know where they are. There are several hundred pounds of them in my basement. They're there because I missed the deadline to sell them back to the bookstore before a new edition came out and now I'm stuck with them. But I figure if I hold on to them long enough, eventually a new addition will come out re-arranged in the exact configuration these old ones are in and they'll be worth something again.
Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
From TFA (Score:3, Interesting)
Hmm changing editions every semester instead of once per year, three-four editions per year. Sounds like some publishers are really not und
Re:Dirty thieves (Score:5, Informative)
There are some logical and factual problems with your post.
Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
Professors tend to have gone to school when textbooks were much more reasonable in cost. One of my physics professors was shocked when we told him that the book he had picked was $110. He said that he had paid ~$10 for books when he was in college.
It turns out that the publishers just send a lot of books to the professors without telling them how much they cost. The naive ones don't check and the students get screwed.
It seems to me that the only justification for such high prices is the limited print runs t
Re:Dirty thieves (Score:5, Insightful)
The publishers are the dirty thieves (Score:3, Interesting)
My professor almost lost his head when we told him how much we paid (over $60) for the textbook he wrote. He was getting something like $5 for each.
I always look for PDF version. (Score:3, Interesting)
Nice of them to charge $120 for a book that has virtually no useful content but is required to get the assignments out of and then refuse to buy back the books because they are out-dated supposedly.
I've taken to looking for PDF versions of all my text books and tech books both because of price and because I want to be able to carry massive amounts of useful books around on a laptop or a e-book so I have them when I need them. Even the books I actually buy I try to find a torrent for because I don't want to
About time! (Score:5, Insightful)
The problem isn't just that they are expensive, but that the publishers are trying to bilk the students. They include CD-ROMs they know are useless as an excuse to charge higher prices and they come out with a new "edition" every year that changes the page numbers and exercise numbers so that students can't rely on used textbooks.
They got too greedy and pushed too far and that is what will actually give people the motivation to push back.
Photographic and tactile memory (Score:4, Insightful)
When I was in school I found my recall was highly photographic and associative. I assume this is present to different degrees in most people.
When I recalled something in a book I would recall where on the page it was and what was around it. I'd recall how far I had to flip into the book roughly before i'd have to turn individual pages. Even the weight of the binding was memorable.
I found I could learn more from books that had heavy covers, and glossy pages for easy turing, layots that were generous not compact with lots of color and visual reminders.
Thus to me a pdf file of a book on the screen or a Kindle are just viscerally anti-cognative even though the information might be identical.
The visceral nature of a book in not replicated on laser printed and bound paper. It just does not flip right for me.
Re:Photographic and tactile memory (Score:5, Insightful)
You can print and bind a book at Kinkos or throw it in a three-ring binder for well under $100.
Re:Photographic and tactile memory (Score:5, Informative)
Every printer and copier (manufactured by the big name manufacturers you have heard of) in the world has unique finger printed water marking that identify its serial number, and where it was sold. Thus if a criminal printed off a threatening letter and mailed it to somebody, that letter can be identified to have been printed from a specific copier or printer. Perfect for setting up a stakeout of somebody printing leaflets from a specific Kinkos shop in a specific city on a specific street. I don't know if the intel companies paid for that technology, but they certainly convinced the manufacturers to implement that technology.
Re: (Score:3)
http://news.uns.purdue.edu/UNS/html4ever/2004/041011.Delp.forensics.html [purdue.edu]
Was also a previous slashdot story
http://it.slashdot.org/it/04/10/14/1742224.shtml [slashdot.org]
Re: (Score:3, Informative)
Every printer and copier (manufactured by the big name manufacturers you have heard of) in the world has unique finger printed water marking that identify its serial number, and where it was sold.
The link does not say that at all. It says that by looking at the printing characteristics, you can identify the model of the printer (i.e., just by data that appears in the printed image as a byproduct of the printing process, not by anything intentionally added by the manufacturer). Furthermore, there would be no way of identifying which printer of a certain model made the printed image without having reference pages to compare to.
Re:Photographic and tactile memory (Score:5, Insightful)
Though I agree with you in practice, I think you fail to recognise that the same phenomonon can exist in digital media...
When I watch a video using my computer, I can very quickly find a segment of video by adjusting a slider, and I find that I am usually suprisingly accurate.
When I read a long webpage (mostly slashdot comments), and return to it later, I KNOW without a doubt that more comments have been added because something seems further down on the scroll bar than I remember.
The physical association can be translated to digital, especially if some thought is given to it. For example, what about a reader that applies a slight hue to the pages; eg as you get further into a chapter the pages become more red... I would bet that you could scan very quickly to a page with minimal practice. Add some sound whenever you change pages so that the tone changes depending upon how far into the file you are, maybe even include a visual "stack" that will show the ratio of pages before to pages after your current page.
With enough forms of reference, you will be able to train your mind to locate data in a file just as quickly as you do in a physical book. Then of course there is the clickable index, search functionality, table of figures (with thumbnails), etc... all this adds up to a book that is far more of a reference tool than paper books.
I don't want to sit and read a novel on a computer, or most ebook readers... but textbooks could be VERY powerful if implemented correctly. I am quite certain that the only reason that they haven't all gone digital yet is that the college crowd also happens to be one of the largest populations of copywrite violators and they know that they will only sell one or two copies of the book!
If I were them I would license text ebooks to the teacher/school instead of selling them to the students. For example, they 'sell' the ebook to the school to freely distribute to it's students, however for each student enrolled in a class that requires that text they must be paid $x. It would be relatively easy to prevent teachers from illegally using the text (offer a reward to students who report it) there is little incentive for the school/teacher to violate the license as they will simply pass the cost to the student as a fee, and finally the returns can be just as good as the license would only be good for that single class session.
It's only a matter of time... traditional publishing will die off eventually, it may take a generation or two, but it will happen.
Exactly. (Score:3, Insightful)
Sad isn't it?
For 99% of the courses, 99.9% of the material will NOT change from year to year.
Yet the textbooks are re-released almost every year.
Now, the only downsides I see to having Free (as in Freedom) textbooks available in digital form are:
#1. The answers to the exercises WILL be available on-line. So? If the instructor cannot come up with his/her own exercises then s/he needs to find a new job.
#2. Printing on a laser printer is more expensive than in a print shop. But if students only print out the e
Re:Exactly. (Score:5, Funny)
I must admit it will be easier to send a pdf rather than an actual book when I outsource getting my degree overseas.
Re:Exactly. (Score:5, Interesting)
Not to mention a huge part of the learning process is making mistakes when they don't cost very much. That is part of how I learn at least. By grading us both on homework and tests you are telling us its better to make sure you know how to game the system than it is to actually UNDERSTAND the material.
Teachers gaming the system (Score:3, Interesting)
In high school (early 1990s), I had a calculus teacher who was _required_ by the school system to count homework as part of the grade. So, he had a simple formula:
Re:About time! (Score:5, Insightful)
Yet another industry's outdated business model falls victim to progress. Publishers and authors have a right to earn a living from their work, but so long as they're unfair about it people will subvert the system.
Textbooks are ideal for digital distribution - no shipping, no heavy books to carry, and they're seachable. They'll just have to drop the hefty, inflated pricing model. Sorry guys!
Publishing will go digital, kicking and screaming, but they'll go. Amazon knew this, why do you think they're pushing the Kindle so hard? As an avid reader I'm almost on board but not quite yet.
Re:About time! (Score:5, Interesting)
Kindle is not an accurate use for digital distribution. It's a big ole marketing hype. Kindle is akin to 1 step of a complete staircase.
Content control is not the solution, and the device is a piece of garbage. DRM and other problems [teleread.org]left and right. People just like that it's cheaper than normal books. This not being kindle's fault but the publisher's own.
Wait until people create a double sided OLED bendable/foldable reader....then you're good. I'm sure its being developed as we speak, probably by MIT or CMU.
Once book prices go reasonable online (say 2-5 bucks a book at maximum), then things will sell like hotcakes and piracy will drop. For now, even e-books for some books [amazon.com] are ridiculously priced.
Internet/computers have created their own market for pricings. Until pricing gets to a volume level instead of scarcity level, things will continue to be purchased illegitimately. I'm not going to trade a night of going out to the bars just to buy a textbook...but I will download it free [thepiratebay.org] instead.
Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
Publishing will go digital, kicking and screaming, but they'll go
Thus will end the history of Mankind. A thousand or ten thousand years from now, there will be no books, no written history of any kind. A hundred years from the day print books go away, history will be in the hands of those who control the bits and bytes. And, history will be changed with a simple PERL script.
And, when something happens, a supervirus, a massive EMP pulse, whatever, then access to the data, and possibly the data itself will be gone.
Re:About time! (Score:5, Insightful)
I'm of mixed minds about this. I support reasonable copyright laws -- "reasonable" being the operative word there -- and I object to piracy on general principle, but I have to say that the practices of some companies or industries are so egregious that I have a hard time mustering any sympathy for them. Textbook publishers are a case in point. New editions every other year, absurd prices ... it's really quite a racket. I remember one hydrology textbook that was about 200 pages and cost $70. I bought the book, copied every page at 10 cents per page, and returned the book the following day. Can't say that I was all that broken up about what I did. Seventy bucks for a 200 page book is ridiculous ... and that was more than 10 years ago. I can't imagine what that company is asking for a similar book today.
Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
Bravo! You are spot on. It's time to force professors and universities to turn to open source information sources, especially so for public domain knowledge.
Unfortunately for the publishers, copyright does not apply to material that is duplicated for educational and research purposes, and such textbook torrents are 100% legal. Hoist up the countersuits. Prepare the public relations broadsides.
http://www.copyright.gov/title17/92chap1.html#107 [copyright.gov]
107. Limitations on exclusive rights: Fair use40
Notwithstanding the provisions of sections 106 and 106A, the fair use of a copyrighted work, including such use by reproduction in copies or phonorecords or by any other means specified by that section, for purposes such as criticism, comment, news reporting, teaching (including multiple copies for classroom use), scholarship, or research, is not an infringement of copyright.
Which parts of the Newtonian physics principles will the textbook
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
"Which parts of the Newtonian physics principles will the textbook publishers try to claim is copyrighted"
You don't seem to understand copyright. If it were the principles that mattered then why not just read Newtons writing himself?
I hated buying textbooks.. (Score:2, Interesting)
Re:I hated buying textbooks.. (Score:5, Interesting)
Tricks of the Trade:
If the teacher hands out a syllabus with homework: take photos of every single homework problem. I had a good high res camera. Much faster than scanning. When it came time to do homework I just printed out the problem and did it. I got a $5 2 edition old book to actually use as reference.
Learn if the teacher actually hands out problems from the book, if not, get an edition 2-3 old.
Get an 'international' edition. Yes, those poor Chinese/Indians get cheap Microsoft products AND cheap books. Be careful, it won't be hard cover.
When returning books: Find the UPC of the "New" edition, slap it on your old edition and return it. Do it during the highest rush when the checkers in are just trying to get through everyone. I think I would net around $100 a semester buying $5 books and returning them for $30. Screw you book store.
Re:I hated buying textbooks.. (Score:5, Insightful)
A note on the 2nd trick. You have to be of greater than a certain intelligence. I used a Chem book 2-3 editions old for Chem I/II (It's freaking chemistry...). I couldn't use any of the "Turn to page XXXX" instructions. Homework never came from the book (there was no homework).
Worst case was they re arranged the chapters. Chapter 4: Reactions was now Chapter 14: Reactions. You have to be smart enough to know how to use a table of contents. I suggested this to my brother (freshmen last year) and it was lost on him. He broke down and ended up buying a book.
One more:
Buy from Half.com EARLY. Most large schools will post their required books before the end of the previous semester. Now is prime time to be shopping. You'll have them for the first day of school and know well ahead of time if they'll work.
Last resort:
For all my engineering books the Engineering Library kept 2 copies at all times that you could not check out. If you're waiting on a book or really want to kill time, you can live in the library to do your homework. If nothing else, just copy the problems out of it every few weeks and use your 'useless' copy as reference.
Finally, Engineers, keep your books. I wish I did. I can't name the times I've needed flow equations, thermo, controls, etc. Sure most of it is on wiki, but it's not in the format that you learned it. Unless you go straight into marketing or something, you're probably going to use something at least once.
Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
Re:I hated buying textbooks.. (Score:5, Insightful)
When returning books: Find the UPC of the "New" edition, slap it on your old edition and return it. Do it during the highest rush when the checkers in are just trying to get through everyone. I think I would net around $100 a semester buying $5 books and returning them for $30. Screw you book store.
Don't you mean "Screw you poor student who later bought this book and didn't realize the problem until it's too late"?
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:I hated buying textbooks.. (Score:4, Informative)
Once I figured this out, I brought a bunch of my used, older textbooks back to my current school at the beginning of one semester to return. some of these being from another school in another country. since the buyback company's software had the isbn/book in its system, they gave me credit for the book. I came back the next day with a bunch of my wife's old textbooks, and some more of mine, and after one or two books came up not in their system, a supervisor came over and informed me that I couldn't just unload my old books onto them, despite their computer having accepted them, and despite the posters everywhere talking about "unload your old books...this week only..."
It's about time (Score:5, Interesting)
The scam of requiring a new textbook every three years with the page numbers being the biggest change almost makes the music industry look like nice people.
Why was that modded funny? (Score:5, Insightful)
Super (Score:2)
Just what we need, yet another 'industry' to harass us and call us names.
I support this (Score:5, Insightful)
After having to pay for a new algebra book (75$'s) because, apparently, algebra changed since last year and the teacher insisted I have the new book.
The majority of cost for me to go to a community college here in California is the books, and it is such a scam by the book companies, which also left me wondering "does the teacher get a kick back?"
Why would an algebra teacher insist on the latest book? Because his exercises are there so it makes it easy to correct? Why?
Who cares it's a rip off any way you look at it.
This is one example of information that should be free, or extremely cheap, at least when it comes to types of knowledge (math) that has not changed for centuries.
Re:I support this (Score:5, Informative)
Some teachers get a kickback (esp. if they are the author of the book) but here in Florida a law just passed that prevents requiring a book that the teacher wrote, unless it is on a departmental level (as opposed to the course level)
Re:I support this (Score:5, Interesting)
The majority of cost for me to go to a community college here in California is the books, and it is such a scam by the book companies, which also left me wondering "does the teacher get a kick back?"
Yes, teachers do get a kick back. One of my professors told our post grad class (during one of the much loved 'pub lectures') how they could stand to make $1000s from recommending the 'right' books.
Re:I support this (Score:5, Informative)
The majority of cost for me to go to a community college here in California is the books, and it is such a scam by the book companies, which also left me wondering "does the teacher get a kick back?"
Yes, teachers do get a kick back. One of my professors told our post grad class (during one of the much loved 'pub lectures') how they could stand to make $1000s from recommending the 'right' books.
I'm a physics/astronomy professor, and this is news to me. In fact, there is a state law (OK) that prevents us from receiving *any* financial incentive from textbook reps. In fact, it is even illegal for us to sell our evaluation copies. There are always unethical people on both sides of the street, I suppose.
Textbook prices are determined by monopolies (Score:5, Insightful)
The big problem here is that the price of textbooks has increased at a far higher rate than inflation. Students are forced to buy whatever textbook their class uses, so the publisher can set whatever price they wish - the students still have to use the books. Essentially, the publishers are granted monopolies on books for specific groups of students.
To combat this, many students buy used books. Many school bookstores offer few or no new textbooks for some classes, because they make a lot of money buying textbooks back and reselling them for more money. Publishers claim this further drives up the price, because they don't get a cut of resales. This may be true, but they've created this situation by pricing new textbooks so much higher than what their market can reasonably afford.
What they are really talking about here with changing the problems is shutting down the used textbook market. If you can't use the book from last semester, the used book becomes nearly worthless.
wow (Score:3, Insightful)
I've benefited a lot from the GPL, but in the back of my mind I've always considered Richard Stallman as something of a crackpot.. A bit too odd..
But the more I think about it, the more he makes sense. He's talking about software, but imagine if other knowledge was as free as the source code. Imagine how *anyone* could learn and be productive without the barrier of money.
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
I've benefited a lot from the GPL, but in the back of my mind I've always considered Richard Stallman as something of a crackpot.. A bit too odd..
But the more I think about it, the more he makes sense. He's talking about software, but imagine if other knowledge was as free as the source code. Imagine how *anyone* could learn and be productive without the barrier of money.
Hello... creative commons [wikipedia.org]?
Piracy helps against gouging.. (Score:2)
When I was in college, I had lots of classes where we needed multiple $100+ textbooks - more than the cost of the course! I had a class once (business law) where the professor wrote 3 of the five books we needed and charged $90 for each book (paperback) and he required all five books. As far as I saw, we never even used two of the books out of the five!
College textbooks are completely ridiculous - and the material is not changing enough to warrant the insanely high costs. So, I say - good for the students t
Re:Piracy? Or Completely Legal! (Score:5, Interesting)
Textbook torrents are specifically for the purpose of education!
Title 17 of the United States Code
107. Limitations on exclusive rights: Fair use40
Notwithstanding the provisions of sections 106 and 106A, the fair use of a copyrighted work, including such use by reproduction in copies or phonorecords or by any other means specified by that section, for purposes such as criticism, comment, news reporting, teaching (including multiple copies for classroom use), scholarship, or research, is not an infringement of copyright.
Yarrgh! Victory in sites, Captain. Yo ho ho!
Once this is easily demonstrated, music will be as easily demonstrated next. Knowledge Is Power!
Re: (Score:3, Informative)
Sure. Here they are.
(1) the purpose and character of the use, including whether such use is of a commercial nature or is for nonprofit educational purposes;
Nothing there. Completely nonprofit noncommercial and completely for educational purposes.
(2) the nature of the copyrighted work;
Uh, what is it's nature? It covets? It's nature is that it is infinitely reproducible information, itself containing many aspects of public domain non copyrighted knowledge. It only seems fair that one be able to enlist an infinite team of interns to comb the file to make sure there are not any copyright infringements (or instances of plagiarism, or instances of incorrect attribution) in the file. A
Surprise? (Score:2)
The worst are courses where the books are updated year-by-year so that the practice problems will be different (I've even seen cases whe
Incentive for Profs? (Score:2, Insightful)
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Re: (Score:3, Informative)
I'm a college professor. We don't have any choice about changing editions. The old editions just go out of print. The actual changes from one edition to the next may be minor, and students who are able to get their hands on an old editio
There are ways to do this (Score:4, Informative)
Our Introduction to Finance course in uni had a decent approach to the textbook issue. We had the option to purchase the text book, but were also given free access to a PDF version of the book online through our uni intranet, which was locked to prevent printing or saving.
Yes, having to view it online was slightly inconvenient, but for many cash strapped students it was less convenient than having to fork out wads of cash for the print version.
Before anyone says it - yes, I mean 'free' as in we didn't have to specifically pay to access it - of course there's fees and such forth that cover the cost.
Textbooks are ridiculously expensive (Score:2)
Screw the textbooks... (Score:2, Funny)
Legal end run? (Score:2)
Cost per page (Score:2)
$75 for an ethics book (Score:2)
and the bastards won't even give me an electronic copy. Hell, I'd pay more for my calc text if there was an digital copy.
Why(besides the typical bullshit reasons)can I not get a nice electronic copy of my textbooks when I buy them? Only one book ever did that and it was my stupid java book.
Re:$75 for an ethics book (Score:5, Funny)
Re:$75 for an ethics book (Score:5, Funny)
My girlfriend recently took a class called "Ethics In Computer Science" and another called "Philosophy of Mediation" and realized that she could write *one* paper to satisfy a homework assignment from each class.
So which is worse: writing it for the Ethics class, then reusing it for Philosophy after you've taken the Ethics class, or writing it for the Philosophy class and then reusing it for the Ethics class?
We decided the latter was more acceptable after arguing about it for a while, on the basis that, hey, she hadn't learned about ethics yet, right?
A good idea? (Score:2)
It's not my intention to troll, but this certainly won't help the cost aspect of it. College textbooks are different from music CDs in their profit margin. They differ at least in the cost of production and the frequency of purchase. There has to be some justifiable reason for professors to write these books -- they need compensation for their time.
I'm
Textbooks = hidden tuition. (Score:5, Informative)
It's been a number of years since I worked as an adjunct professor, but even then textbooks were outrageously expensive. I didn't even want to specify textbooks for my classes, but the school administration would always force me to pick one to use for the course. The reason was that the school made money from every textbook sold. It killed me to force struggling students to purchase expensive textbooks that they would hardly use, but I didn't have much choice. In a way it was as if the school was hiding part of their tuition within the book costs.
Textbook authors deserve to be paid. (Score:3, Insightful)
I'm sorry but I can't sit and watch liberals destroy themselves in the pursuit of free works.
Its one thing that the likes of any number of political musicians might suddenly find themselves without a fat paycheck once CD sales approach zero, its quite another when the very academic backbone on the country is assaulted.
It takes an enormous amount of work to make a good academic text. You can't just learn something like physics by skimming a few blog quotes, or get a real sense of any field, for that matter, by reading books. Is it unfortunate that they cost a lot? Yes, it is. But books have always been historically valuable things and the bulk of that value has been in the content.
I've read MIT Open Courseware and a lot of it actually is not that deep. A few syllabi and class notes and homework assignments is not the same as the book the class refers to!
Textbook authors deserve to be paid. If you have a society where authors do not get paid, you basically wipe out the entire academic basis of learning in the USA, and with it, our country. People's quests for knowledge about the world will not go away when you get rid of books, and, instead of books, they will have their heads filled with muddy, wrong and incorrect web sites all measured more by how many clicks they get from adsense than any real academic measure of the value of the work.
Indeed, there's a lot of that already.
But hey, if all of these professors want to work for free... they are more than welcome to it, but I guarantee them this - preachers -never- work for free, and, if people want to screw over universities because they don't want to pay their authors, then, we'll wind up reverting back to a medieval society.
Re:Textbook authors deserve to be paid. (Score:5, Insightful)
No one is saying they shouldn't be paid. What most are saying is that the true market value of their work is much lower than what they sell their stuff for, mostly because they use highly unethical tactics to artificially increase their asking price such as
* Monopoly lock in (students have no choice but to buy their goods)
* Bribes to institutions and teachers
* New editions whose sole purpose is to make older editions incompatible so as to kill the second hand market.
Simply put, their business practices are unethical and dishonest.
Re: (Score:3, Informative)
I write a couple of articles here and there and once you calculate income per hour it's less than minimum wage.
Time for the OSS Community to act (Score:4, Interesting)
We know about the http://www.opentextbook.org/ [opentextbook.org] initiative. I can't see anything on their site about how they validate the textbooks. It's easy enough with books that are published by existing publishers, but what if you want to write an open textbook?
One of the things that makes a textbook an acceptable reference in research is that it is peer-reviewed. That peer-review has the benefit of checking for errors as well as giving some assurance that the content is correct. I'd hate to buy a maths book that messed up how to do a derivative.
We need the peer-review if these books are ever going to be taken seriously. This is a not a radical idea. It is, in many ways, a return to the past when academic ideas where exchanged freely.
What I would suggest is that those of us with Ph.D.'s in our fields set up some sort of agreement to review each other's "open source" texts under a few conditions (negotiable, of course).
One of those should be that if I'm going to review the textbook for free that the textbook itself should be available in a usable form for free or nearly free Download the pdf for free or for some very small amount to help offset hosting costs. There is no reason an electronic copy of a textbook should cost $90.
A second condition, courtesy, would be to mention the reviewers.
A third would be to include some blurb in the text about the whole open textbook thing and why the textbook was published at so little cost, etc. In other words, spread the word.
Printing costs money, and that is understandable. Lulu, and other services, offer on-demand printing. The OWASP project offer their materials via Lulu at cost, and free for electronic download.
I know there are many Slashdot readers who have Ph.D.'s in their fields. I also know that there are many who will be offended by my mentioning the Ph.D. or other doctoral degree as a qualification, but if we want these texts to be taken seriously in universities, then they need to follow the criteria that universities use when assessing textbooks. Sorry. If it is going to be taken seriously, then at least the "lead" author needs to have the degree or be someone very, very famous in the field (such as Bruce Schneier).
I'm going to contact the Open Textbook people, but I'd like to see who here in the Slashdot community would be willing to put in some time to see something like this work. Here's a chance to fight back in a way that is legal, ethical, and just may work.
There are plenty of people on Slashdot who are more than adequately qualified to write university-grade textbooks on various subjects.
I'm sure some people are going to flame me for this. It was not my intent to offend anyone. I am an adjunct professor, so I am somewhat familiar with how textbooks are evaluated and selected.
I think we can make a difference here, just like the OSS community have made a difference in software.
I find it amusing that the CAPTCHA for this post is "computes".
The site is already down. (Score:4, Informative)
Expensive texts don't make sense anymore (Score:3, Interesting)
Back in the day, expensive texts made sense. Why? Because the publisher received a typed manuscript with equations, etc *written* in. They then had to take that, reformat, etc, etc, etc and finally set the machines up and print the thing. A very time intensive expensive process.
That being said, the world has changed. What publishers get today is pretty much a finished work. And because we've entered the wonderful world of computers, they just need to input the file and push the start button. It's now a considerable cheaper process. But, yet the price of texts has increases very much disproportionally.
What I find deplorable, is that old texts like Rudin's Principles of Mathematical Analysis (1976) costs $185 (hardcover) and $90 (softcover). Then there's Dudley's Elementary Number Theory (1978) which cost ~$120 when I bought it a couple years ago and Nering's Linear Algebra and Matrix Theory (amazon says 1976 but my copy says 1970) which costs $145. All three being some of the best books in there respective fields. But, the cost is prohibitive and quite frankly nonsensical. There's exactly zero reason why they should be so expensive when it is clear that they have since recouped the cost long ago.
I gotta say that if the publishers get significantly hurt because of downloading, they've done it to themselves. I won't be shedding any tears.
All Hail Dover (Score:4, Interesting)
Dover [doverpublications.com] publishes textbooks that are old, but still useful, for a far more reasonable price than they charge for new textbooks.
Re: (Score:2)
You're right, up to a point. But I think that most people here see it as a matter of principle. I, for one, didn't waste much money on partying w/ friends, etc. However, I balked at the outrageous book prices in college and grad. school, especially when I started to research things like highschool "bindings" on books, and how shoddily made many books are these days. Printing and binding costs simple aren't *that much*.
Most of my professors were very careful about which books they chose
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
All of the "alternative" expenses you are talking about are OPTIONAL
and are a matter of CHOICE. They are entered into by the relevant
parties of their own FREE WILL and not forced on them by artificial
means.
If I want a good reference book for my profession I will seek those
out and don't need to be led by the nose by the University. The fact
that it might last me 80 years doesn't excuse the fact that students
are being raped on prices for content that may have not changed in
80 years.
This is just something else
Re:Thank god (Score:4, Insightful)
Hah, that will not happen.
They will offer them with some crazy Windows Vista only DRM, priced the exact same as the printed book, and then use the complete lack of sales as a "see, people don't want e-book versions" example.
(I really wish I was being a bit too pessimistic there, but...)
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
If you guys start stealing text books too just keep in mind that its the lthe little guys who will suffer like the unions who man the presses and the shmoos like me who are paid to put the book together.
Wow. Robots have actually unionized?
Students are suffering already (Score:5, Informative)
I'm sorry, I know your job depends on the publishers being able to rip us off, but most of us don't have jobs. I've been able to land decent summer jobs because of my skills and major, but the majority of my friends are either unemployed or will not make enough money this summer to completely cover the cost of their books. This expense is added to the price of tuition, which some of my friends can barely afford. If the new American dream is to go to college, get a degree, and make lots of money, these publishers are pushing more and more people out of that dream.
I'm not exaggerating, by the way. A lot of people have trouble coming up with the money for textbooks. A single $100+ book would be manageable, but when it is a matter of 6 or 7 such books every few months, it becomes a problem. It flies in the face of copyright law (pre-DMCA), but I can see why people would turn to torrents to get their textbooks.
Speaking as a publisher (Score:5, Insightful)
Me? I'm buying my own HP 8100's, my own heavy duty binder and laminator, my own trimmer, etc. and plan to shift all of my production except for large posters and some letterpress inhouse within two years, at most. And since I won't be giving so much of my money to jobbers, I'll be all the better positioned to A.) do short runs at much lower capital investment, B.) shift to tree-free paper and other resources the large, commodity printers don't want to be bothered with, C.) produce books with unusual formats, ink, etc.
In an age of print-on-demand and ever more standardized products from the ever more consolidated megapublishers, it's more important than ever to pay attention to these things. Their stuff may be getting more and more plasticized. My stuff [streetcarpress.com] will be getting less and less so. And from the feedback I'm getting so far, customers love this kind of customization and attention to detail, including people in the educational market. I've been speaking to some schools who are quite interested in having some input in what they use without having to pay or charge their students an arm and a leg.
Oh, and fwiw, I think that you mean "shmoes". Unless, that is, you're a gelatinous white blog that without limbs that can't speak.