My behavioral biology teacher wrote his own textbook but it was only $30 and it was more of a workbook to help us study. However, we did have SOME teachers who demanded we buy books brand new (they would reject students who used the secondhad bookstore across from campus and would demand you bring your new books shrinkwrapped to the first day of class). My (mandatory) "Intro to Computers" class had a set of books you had to buy new (with severely limited information, much of it obsolete) that came to $500. I actually went to the Student Government to ask why we had to do this. Their response? "The university is underfunded and students need to do their part to make up the difference". I should also mention that the Dean had a stated policy of making life hard on "Non-Traditional" students and this seemed like a great way to thin those numbers.

A sweetheart at an academic library says journals for all fields —including the science-moistened peer-review darlings we're so fond of— have become a naked racket, published by profiteers certain that careerists in these fields are happy with the status quo, and have no reason to let cheaper, open-source solutions interfere with their income.

Specifically, this librarian described a meeting at which a sales team from one of these outfits warned of forthcoming price increases. The response to requests for patience with smaller departments was shameless, steadfast rejection.
They don't care whether you're big or small.

It's nice to want to pay the legal price for things, but this is similar to what Archer Daniels Midland has done with High Fructose Corn Syrup. Now isn't the time to say 'We need to keep our hands off the marketplace!'… They've already pulled strings in DC and our statehouses to make their wretched products so successful.

I teach, but outside the US. We do occasionally find a US textbook that we would like to use. We usually decide against it. Your students are so screwed...

First, the textbook prices are nuts, at $100 or more. Second, if an electronic version is available, as likely as not it is at least as expensive as the dead-tree version.

Finally, there is a new edition every single year, and the only substantive difference is the increased price. Oh, and the fact that previous editions are no longer available.

For lots of my courses, I don't use a textbook at all; instead, I just give links to resources on the Internet. The textbook industry is where the music industry was 20 years ago, before it finally understood about the Internet. What we are seeing here is the flailing of a dying industry.

tl;dr: Of course, the students pirate the things...

That "Druyan" post is still up in Google, it's just badly formatted... I think it's just had the images removed. It's from tumblr, which is all about images, right? Pics might have been on a separate server, so there might be nothing sinister happening. Google, like Wayback, might not cache images, or be permitted to do so per copyright. And it wasn't actually Ann Druyan, which might be why the original is gone.

The quotation on on Amy's blog post is accurate. If you mouse around on the "gone" page, you can find the links for alternative sources for textbooks.

The online thing started happening when I was adjuncting a couple years ago. Just as I was leaving, they were making the switch to the pure online textbook.

The advantages are the computer corrects the online homework and sends the result to the professor, who can see how students are doing, and what they are bad at, etc.

The disadvantages are they expire after a semester or two, so you can't hang onto it to look stuff up, or resell it, or otherwise get use of it after your semester. Also, they cost as much as regular books, which is bullshit, as once the content is developed the production cost of producing more books is effectively 0.

Also, students learn better by writing things out and hand correcting their work than they do digitally.

> The textbook industry is where the
> music industry was 20 years ago,
> before it finally understood about
> the Internet. What we are seeing
> here is the flailing of a dying
> industry.

☑ Bradley

Pop records weren't worth what most people paid for them in 1997. The internet (and Steve Jobs) corrected the price of the product.

Nowadays, Google and Apple and (I think) Amazon offer services to sniff through the music files on your disk (stolen or not), freshen them up with the best available digital versions, and bring you into legal compliance for peanuts... Something like $30 for two thousand songs. (That's not a real number, but I forget.)

(Anyone know the details of these things?)

Therefore, there's no way a Clinton-era price of $20 for a Whitney Houston CD could properly express the value of the product.

The music industry has essentially confessed: Yeah, we were cheating you.

I'm usually sympathetic on the matter of copyrighted materials.

But not this time.

In theory a textbook's new edition should have new information. (It doesn't, or if it does…we're talking 2-3 pages or less)

But the price is jacked up over and over and over again, and the course requires these books.

They do this because they have only a short time to recoup their costs…or so the claim is made…but why the hell should this make any damn sense?

Once you've done your research to create the bulk of the book, not much changes in the course of a few months between one class and the next. Why the hell shouldn't it be good enough to use for years? The used market can be held accountable to a degree, since people won't buy new if they can buy used, particularly of an item they only need once in their lives.

But this too is ridiculous. At this stage all these books should be available online and you just pay a subscription fee for access to the material for the semester, password good from the start of your course to perhaps a week or so after if you run over time due to illness etc.

Then just update the online material as new information emerges.

The current model is such obvious price gouging that I just can't feel any sympathy for the publishers on this one. You must have it, it must be new…oh and its $200-$500 while you're living on Ramen noodles and dollar store burritos…

The 'theft' here, is not just on the student side.

@Crid: I agree - music was way overpriced. This is exactly what fed music piracy - the music industry was unwilling to adapt, offer music at the correct price and via download and streaming.

The "fight against piracy" has quieted down in the last few years, as the industry has finally adapted. Importantly: this adaptation was forced by the piracy - because people were unwilling to be ripped off any longer.

Exactly the same thing is now happening to textbooks - students are no longer so willing to put hundred of dollars down for a textbook for every course, when equally good material is available for less - or for free - on the Internet. So, if they are required to have a ridiculously priced textbook, they pirate it...

This rot extends down to schoolchildren. Every year I drop a mortgage payment for new textbooks that come with passwords to activate the online modules.

I'd love to see some hackers get rich busting this racket, but I don't see how the test ("Show me your textbook") can be legally dodged.

As an aside, I've heard that the good folks of Texas are busy... fixing... children's schoolbooks. They're the tail that wags the dog.

http://www.tfn.org/site/PageServer?pagename=issues_sboe_index

If they went into the campus bookstore and walked out with the book without paying, that's stealing.
If they went onto the internet and downloaded a copy, that's copying.

Both actions may be illegal, but they are different actions, and conflating the two is unhelpful.

The really fun part is that English language soft cover versions of most of the books for the hard sciences and engineering are available overseas for pennies on the normal price (only the questions are wrong, and we went ahead and copied those). I bought a few books off of someone who was importing them from relatives and making a profit, then buying us all pizzas for our study group (good dude). I can't seem to find it, but I recall a textbook company brought a lawsuit against a student who was from Thailand, bought his books there, and took them with him to the U.S. when he visited family in Thailand, and would sell the ones he was done with to friends. They had a big problem with that, where my problem lies with the fact that the publishers are charging $25 for a book in Thailand, and $300 for the same text in the U.S. Explain why I should like a group as crony capitalist as textbook publishers, and I'll feel sympathy that their exorbitantly priced product is being pirated.

Copyright?

You mean the copyright that basically lives forever? every time Mickey Mouse is about to enter the public domain, DisneyCorps buys the best senators and representatives to extend their copyright another couple of decades.

To promote the Progress of Science and useful Arts, by securing for limited Times to Authors and Inventors the exclusive Right to their respective Writings and Discoveries;

So much for limited. The journals Crid references are also living on borrowed time. Not only do they charge libraries a small fortune to subscribe to them, they also charge a somewhat smaller fortune to get published in them.

I am not one of those who thinks that a textbook is useless after it is been used for a class, but I was appalled to find out what the industry is doing - something you have not mentioned yet:
Different versions of the same textbook are required by colleges in the same area.
The title is the same, the authors are the same, the name of the course is the same, but if you go to Clemson, you cannot use a textbook designated for the University of South Carolina, and vice versa.
If this was gasoline, the sellers would be invited for price gouging.

Property exists because of scarcity. Information is not scarce (my knowing something does not preclude you from knowing the same thing), therefore information is not property.

If I walk out of a bookstore with an unpaid-for book, I've taken actual property from someone. If a computer on the internet informs my computer of a particular way to arrange the bits on a hard drive I own, I have not taken anything from anyone, nor deprived anyone of said information.

I used to believe as you did, so I understand how the mistake gets made, but Kinsella convinced me otherwise.

A sweetheart at an academic library says journals for all fields —including the science-moistened peer-review darlings we're so fond of— have become a naked racket, published by profiteers certain that careerists in these fields are happy with the status quo, and have no reason to let cheaper, open-source solutions interfere with their income.

Ah, yes, Elsevier. Fortunately, I only deal with them for conference proceedings. The astronomy journals are still from University presses, the Royal Astronomical Society, etc. They all go public after a year. (It would be immediate but subscriptions from universities to the journals are the only thing still keeping them afloat). The for-profit ones are a mess and I'm glad my field does not use them.

So...

How is {copying copyrighted material} a crime that should be prosecuted, but {buying and using illicit drugs} a valid protest against drug laws?

One's ire should not be driven by one's personal stake in the issue.

So...

How is {copying copyrighted material} a crime that should be prosecuted, but {buying and using illicit drugs} a valid protest against drug laws?

Copying copyrighted material for personal use, should be a misdemeanor, way down there on the sin scale, with parking ticket level of enforcement.

Copying copyrighted material, and then selling it to others, I have less sympathy for.

When I was in college, if you were truly poor, the library kept about five copies of every required text available for check out.

I bought a professor's book about one of the poets his class was studying, a book not required I hasten to add, and when saw that I had it, he pulled a dime out of his pocket and tossed it to me saying he didn't intend to make his royalties from students. But he was a little crazy in other ways as well

It's been ages since I've been in school, the books were expensive then and we had 2 rival used book stores going, one run by the bookstore one by the students.
I guess professors were less money grubbing back then, many would on the first day tell us not to bother with the new edition and wold go over the changes from last edition, (usually a correction rather than new material).

I'm wondering if some of this is because using the professors book has become the norm, for a lot more classes. If you only teach two 30 person classes, and no other university uses your book, you have a very limited target audience.

@ Radwaste:
You're usually more alert than this. The first is a theft from another individual, harming her intellectual property rights in the material. This was prohibited as far back as the 8th Commandment. In legal terms it's a "malum in se."
Drug laws are an example of "malum prohibidum": It's wrong because we say so. If you take drugs no one else is harmed, and you may even have a medical reason or a good time. But we're unsure why you would be punished for it other than "Because we said so."
Chris Rhodes' bits-on-a-hard-drive argument is even less persuasive. The author is the one who is directing those bits to arrange themselves using her intellectual abilities. A skill Chris may not have in some subjects.

At least the Diamond industry makes you believe you need a new rock and that's why people don't buy used.....

Can't wait until our education system crumbles.

Chris Rhodes' bits-on-a-hard-drive argument is even less persuasive. The author is the one who is directing those bits to arrange themselves using her intellectual abilities. A skill Chris may not have in some subjects.

Posted by: Canvasback at September 22, 2014 7:35 AM

I think many of you misunderstand how the text book industry works. The author does not profit much at all. The University bookstore does.

I have a friend who has written two text books in his highly specialized field. He got almost nothing in royalties from them.

But they look very good on his resume,

As far as the intellectual creativity goes, how much is really going on there with the seventh edition of a math textbook, with a few minor changes in the text?

Textbooks are a very poor way to learn about any subject on your own. They are designed to be obtuse for a reason.

They are a revenue generation device, not an essential element of subject matter instruction.

I had many professors in history classes whose primary material was their own notes. There were supplemental readings , that were histories published for a general audience, available in the library, or I suppose now, on Kindle, for free.

Canvasback,

When the 10 commandments were first written intellectual property wasn't a thing. I doubt the ancient jews would have any issue with making cheap copies of another's designs.

Similarly Rhodes' scarcity creates property is not persuasive. Patent and copyright are temporary government created scarcities. The idea is that by creating these temporary scarcities society can encourage creative works.

For me a key component of that societal good was the temporary nature of the scarcity. Disney style copyright harms society and should be ended. While I have no issue with Amy making money off of her works, her grandchildren shouldn't be able to live off of Amy's work. They need to get their own jobs.

No, let us not try to divert my question.

Copyright laws and drug laws are still laws.

If you endorse disobeying one and not the other, you are simply cherry-picking to make yourself feel good. I expect this. Lots of people do it, especially drug users who tout the many wonderful properties of their favorite without either intending to take advantage of those other properties OR noticing that the other uses are, indeed, already legal.

In the case one argues about "intellectual property" NOT being protected, you might be arguing that corporations have no soul, or that the size of the organization dilutes copyright because of some collaborative efforts.

If and when you do this, you argue that I should replace you at work if I can duplicate your efforts by any means. More to the point, you would excuse plagiarism.

Don't.

Anyone else ever notice that math and biology text books are done in a zillion colors when black and white (or a couple colors) will do? I had a chemistry book with a photo of a skunk in it (skunk smell contains this type of molecule we are discussing here). Basically, these are to increase/justify the price. Back when more colors=more expensive (look at many of Dr. Seuss' books, the older ones are in 1-2 colors with LOTS of shades).

The new edition every year is crap. Then again, I had professors put out books lists and NEVER use or reference the books. Some I never even opened. If they aren't going to use the book, recommend it, or even reference it, it shouldn't be "required" (all our books were listed as required or optional).

That said, it might be lucrative to get a shrink-wrapper and shrink-wrap your own (used) versions!

for a generation who is used to finding all their data and info online, is all this a shock?

using the wayback machine, I used to get my texts from the library, becasue I went to a small school, where some classes were only offered every 4 years, so woe to them that got off track.

This meant that you COULDN'T sell your books back after, because it wasn't offered the next year, and so. "F that!" Any books that I did actually have to shell for against my will, I donated to the library after the semester, so that the next time 'round the poor schmuck would be able to check it out.

I complained vociferously to the school administration, profs and library admin, that they were causing issues with affordability, and that for some it was impossible. Also that it should be a requirement that the library have at least one version of every textbook required.

I don't think they really cared, but it made me feel better.

Meanwhile, tuition rates have gone up 400+% in that time period, fortunately books haven't gone up by that much. But taken as a whole, we are talking pressure.

SO here is a generation wondering if there is EVEN A VALUE to going to college, especially if they can do much of it online...

What could colleges and professors do to ameliorate the issue? Same as they did in the olden days, make sure they only require a latest edition text if there have been major changes. This happens OFTEN in the IT world... in the humanities? Has info on Shakespeare really changed all all that much?

The issue has much to do with the state of the publishing industry. And College bookstores, gotta make a buck... but both are approaching irrelevancy. They need to evolve or perish.

The ethics? Oi be careful of that one... I've seen ehticists make ideas dance a fine jig.

After all, the IDEA of intellectual property in the first place is heavily leveraged on the OTHER forms of property, where ownership is a solid object... rather than ethereal electrons, and even more ethereal ideas falling out of your head.

And there have been plenty of times in my career where I didn't own the ideas in my head, because I signed those rights away for a paltry sum of gold.

After all, the IDEA of intellectual property in the first place is heavily leveraged on the OTHER forms of property, where ownership is a solid object... rather than ethereal electrons, and even more ethereal ideas falling out of your head.

And there have been plenty of times in my career where I didn't own the ideas in my head, because I signed those rights away for a paltry sum of gold.

Posted by: SwissArmyD at September 22, 2014 10:26 AM

I think we are rapidly approaching the age where plagiarism, is the norm. And intellectual property of a non technical nature, is passé. It is such a slippery to define thing anyway.

I mean, here I sit, using the English language. Is there any way to turn a phrase that hasn't been done already?

Scientific, and technical writing, yes, that has it's own rules, but general English literature, and political commentary, aren't we really all just regurgitating?

As far as my limited knowledge of college textbooks, they've always been expensive. Back in the '90s I was paying $200-$700 per textbook (medical) and the "cheap" books were $50-$100 but were mostly just workbooks to follow along with the teaching or materials fees because we got photocopied packets each week of what was being taught. They didn't exist in digital format either. They didn't change books every year back then though, so you could buy the textbooks used assuming they ever became available. That was usually unlikely because of the subject manner and people tended to hang onto them as reference materials. Heck, I just finally got rid of mine a couple months ago, 10-15 years after originally buying them.

I teach college history classes as an adjunct, and I won't assign a book that costs more than $25 -- at the outside, and I mostly try to build every syllabus around books that cost less than $20. It's not that hard.

It's not that hard for students, either: Sociology class requires $200 textbook written by the professor = Take other sociology class. If you *must* have that class for your major, take it online or at a community college and petition for transfer credit.

Information is not scarce (my knowing something does not preclude you from knowing the same thing), therefore information is not property. ~ Posted by: Chris Rhodes at September 22, 2014 6:29 AM

The specific organization of that information and the insights of the amagalmater are, however, intellectual property.

Nonetheless, college textbooks are a racket. When I was in college, professors shamelessly used their own books and textbooks as required reading for their classes - and put out a revised edition every few years and to make sure you had to buy the latest, the reading assignments were by page number rather than chapter (each new edition had a new arrangement).

Like Bradley said, the publishing industry, professors, and college bookstores are struggling against a shifting paradigm. The $100 textbook was obsolete 20 years ago when PDF files and Web sites could do the same job. The problem? Professors have not yet figured out how to monetize a class-specific Web site. And publishers and colleges are heavily invested in the expensive textbook racket.

==============================

Anyone else ever notice that math and biology text books are done in a zillion colors when black and white (or a couple colors) will do? ~ Posted by: Shannon at September 22, 2014 9:27 AM

When my sister was studying engineering in college, she borrowed one of my dad's old formula books. It was published in the 1950s and had no color or illustrations in it. Straight formulas.

She found it more useful than any of the books the College of Engineering had available in the college bookstore and library.

In fact, she almost lost it several times as her fellow students tried to abscond with it. They, too, found it better than what they could buy in the bookstore or borrow from the library.

==============================

In general, universities are struggling against a shift in their paradigm. Although for-profit colleges have sullied the online learning model with poor education and testing techniques, money-grubbing attitudes, and poor student selection processes, some variant of that model will eventually evolve to render the professor-in-a-classroom model archaic.

==============================

All of education is due for a paradigm shift.

There's no reason why two students can't self-study in the same classroom with a teacher or two standing by to help them get through something they don't understand, take a test when ready, and move on to the next level or subject.

Optional lectures or discussion groups can be scheduled to help those that don't learn as well strictly from reading.

No more holding Joe back because Fred can't pick the verb out of a sentence or figure out an algebra problem.

Why can't we do that? Teachers unions can't allow one teacher handling 50 or so self-study students. Cuts down on their income by reducing the number of teachers per classroom.

That and it would require that a teacher actually know the subject matter - something the unions have also been resisting.

For those interested you don't need a shrink wrap machine to shrink wrap a book. You can buy individual sized shrink wrap or shrink wrap tube that can be cut to size. Put wrap on book. Put book on slightly hot surface like a dorm heater or use your parents stove or a hair dryer. Just don't singe the book. Costs a few dollars. Mostly in shipping and handling.

I think we are rapidly approaching the age where plagiarism, is the norm. And intellectual property of a non technical nature, is passé. It is such a slippery to define thing anyway.

***

Approaching? You mean returning to. It was the norm in the Middle Ages/Renaissance.

Problem is, then there's less incentive for people to produce stuff.

When I was adjuncting, if people had the old version of the book I accepted it, even though homework activities had different numbers on them and slightly different questions. I had a system where everyone handed in their homework for the chapter on the day of the test. They graded it themselves, so could use it to study. That way it didn't matter which version they used, I graded it for completeness. The way I saw it, HW is for practice and tests are to measure accuracy.

And intellectual property of a non technical nature, is passé. It is such a slippery to define thing anyway.

"intellectual" - when in the last 50 years were textbooks even remotely intellectual? They existed only to pad the pockets of the bums who wrote the stuff and forced it on their halpess students.

Colleges and universities are supposed to have libraries with actually worthwhile books which kids use during the course semester and return once the semester ends, but of course, with profiteering being the norm among those entities, it is hard to expect such ethical and decent behaviour from them anymore. But when they are not showing decent behaviour anymore, they have no right to expect students to show it to them

Colleges and universities are supposed to have libraries with actually worthwhile books which kids use during the course semester and return once the semester ends, but of course, with profiteering being the norm among those entities, it is hard to expect such ethical and decent behaviour from them anymore. But when they are not showing decent behaviour anymore, they have no right to expect students to show it to them

Posted by: Redrajesh at September 23, 2014 9:32 AM

I agree. The biggest problem with STEM education today is the textbook racket. All those new editions with color photos and obscure analogies do nothing to teach directly to the student. They require * an explainer* which too many high school and college professors are incompetent at, because they never learned the basic concepts themselves.

Last spring, my son bought a used textbook for this fall Electromagnetic Fields class.

Smart move, that.

Until, without warning, this semester's class required a new edition.

Difference? Not a damn thing except the problems at the end of each chapter.

Cost? $300. Fortunately for my son, he has parents who can pony up the coin. There are plenty of his compatriots who are just as smart, and work just as hard, for whom this is a real hardship.

I'm a firm believer in paying for what I get.

Doesn't mean that getting violated in the process won't inspire white-hot fury.

It's not realistic to expect libraries to have a couple hundred copies of every textbook for every class.

It's not realistic to expect libraries to have a couple hundred copies of every textbook for every class.

Posted by: NicoleK at September 24, 2014 3:25 AM

The library can and should maintain digital copies of all required texts.

The captive audience text book racket will come to an end when people cant borrow money for college anymore.

The entire system rests on third party payers
The rich don't notice. The athletes and the poor get scholarships that cover books, and the middle class gets screwed.

I see plenty of signs that they are becoming unwilling to bend over and take it anymore.

Lot of textbook rentals on Amazon Kindle these days. Those full color hard bound texts will shortly be as dead as the DoDo.

If it is unreasonable to expect the school library to have up to date copies of school required text books ... is it reasonable to expect students to have those books?