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Supreme Court sides with student in case over textbooks

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Re: Supreme Court sides with student in case over textbooks

#101

Post by hub_ »

shrikant wrote: post #92

I really liked this bit from the decision: > Third, Wiley and the dissent claim that a nongeographical interpretation will make it difficult, perhaps impossible, for publishers (and other copyright holders) to divide foreign and domestic markets. We concede that is so. A publisher may find it more difficult to charge different prices for the same book in different geographic markets. But we do not see how these facts…

That's why the content industry pushed for the DMCA and used that in the case of the DeCSS case: DMCA as a mean to protect market protection like DVD region encoding.

The problem with physical books is that they can't do it. The know it, the court knows it.

Re: Supreme Court sides with student in case over textbooks

#102

Post by quasse »

chaz wrote: post #95
nitrogen wrote: post #76

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I had an intro EE class where the professor required students to buy practically unreadable handwritten notes from the university copy center. The price breakdown on the copy center receipt: $1.50 for the copies, $8.50 for royalties to the professor . Later on I took MITx's prototype 802.11x online course, where I learned far more and managed an A. In that case the professor actually cowrote the textbook, but there w…

100 students x $8.50 is only $850/semester. Even if the class was 500 students, that's still not an overwhelming amount of money for writing a book. If you're teaching classes that large, you're probably making more money on the lecture circuit and become advisors/consultants at companies.

You would be surprised how low some professors will stoop. My sophomore engineering graphics class required payment of $35 in royalties and $5 in copy fees (going by the standard rate of .10 a page) just to get a printed copy of the PDF course packet (required to pass the course). It wasn't bound or anything, we literally had to go to the privately owned copy center and fork over $40 and then wait while they printed it off and then handed us a stack of paper.

I know that there were ulterior motives on the professor's part because I specifically asked to just print it out myself and was told that the TAs had been specifically banned from allowing students access to the PDF version for printing.

This was a 300 person lecture taught twice per year.

300$352 is $21,000. Suddenly that looks pretty appealing to the professor who thinks he could use a new bass boat this year.

Re: Supreme Court sides with student in case over textbooks

#103

Post by nitrogen »

chaz wrote: post #95
nitrogen wrote: post #76

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I had an intro EE class where the professor required students to buy practically unreadable handwritten notes from the university copy center. The price breakdown on the copy center receipt: $1.50 for the copies, $8.50 for royalties to the professor . Later on I took MITx's prototype 802.11x online course, where I learned far more and managed an A. In that case the professor actually cowrote the textbook, but there w…

100 students x $8.50 is only $850/semester. Even if the class was 500 students, that's still not an overwhelming amount of money for writing a book. If you're teaching classes that large, you're probably making more money on the lecture circuit and become advisors/consultants at companies.

This wasn't a book; it was a bunch of photocopied handwritten notes, maybe 100 pages at most, that appeared not to have been updated in years.

Re: Supreme Court sides with student in case over textbooks

#104

Post by usea »

caseysoftware wrote: post #88
usea wrote: post #47

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If the publisher did this, not only would they lose the sale at the higher price but they'd also cause confusion and mistrust among the students and teacher. There's zero upside.

Make the variance by country and 99.9% of people will never know.

I people don't know, they'll buy the cheaper book. You want them to buy the more expensive version. The publisher gets nothing by "fooling" people. They want people to know, so they buy the more expensive book.

Re: Supreme Court sides with student in case over textbooks

#105

Post by abraxasz »

impendia wrote: post #44
UnoriginalGuy wrote: post #9

The publishers will just make sure to produce a different textbook between different regions now. Just re-order the chapters a little and re-order some questions/assignments. So even if someone ships in the foreign book it will be as useless as a previous edition. In general the whole textbook industry makes me sick. But fact is that lecturers are entirely responsible for it. The publishers can only do what the lectu…

I am a lecturer in a math department. I also despise the textbook industry. Would you please recommend what I might do, subject to severe limitations of (1) time and (2) political clout within my department?

The best class I've ever taken was an intro class in statistics, in which the professor recommended... no book. He had an entire set of notes, practice problems (with extraordinarily detailed answers), and problem sets. Every year, he creates new exam problems so the old exams with answers become practice material. Honestly, his lecture notes (and all the additional material) is so vast that a student would hardly have enough time to study anything outside the notes.

My point is, if a lecturer is really dedicated to providing the best possible experience to his students, he doesn't need a textbook. I'm not saying that it's easy, or that it doesn't require a lot of time and effort from his part. It does. Some lecturers chose to accept the load, while others go the easy way and just point to references and exercises in the book.

Re: Supreme Court sides with student in case over textbooks

#106

Post by CamperBob2 »

saraid216 wrote: post #63
HarryHirsch wrote: post #17

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Publishers are merely exploiting the highly school-like nature of university education in the US. When I was in university, over in Europe, a long time ago, on the first day of lectures the professors would wheel in a cart of textbooks, saying these are suitable texts, go and pick the one that suits you best. But in the US, students demand that their education is like high school, with a set text and all, and if the…

> When I was in university, over in Europe, a long time ago, on the first day of lectures the professors would wheel in a cart of textbooks, saying these are suitable texts, go and pick the one that suits you best. o.O Seriously? How have I never heard that this happens? That's ridiculously sane.

I don't think I agree. If I'm a student paying $XX,XXX per term to attend university, I'm not going to be thrilled at having to beat everyone else in a foot race to pick the one book, out of a random assortment of old books in a pile, that sucks the least. Professional curation of educational resources is a big part of what I'm paying for.

Re: Supreme Court sides with student in case over textbooks

#107

Post by rogueriver »

neilc wrote: post #69
greenyoda wrote: post #18

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The worst offenders are the professors who write their own textbooks (even though there are dozens of better ones already available) and then use them in their courses, making money off each student. Maybe there should be conflict of interest rules in universities. The heroes in this game are the instructors who are creating open-source textbooks.

The worst offenders are the professors who write their own textbooks (even though there are dozens of better ones already available) and then use them in their courses, making money off each student. I think you are seriously overestimating the financial gains such a professor would make. I've taken several classes with profs who teach from their own textbook; the profit per book sold that a prof receives is usually…

I agree. I once had a to buy a professor's book. It was $240.00 of confusing sentence structure, no diagrams(other than manafacture's publicity material, written terribly). He actually made a slightly complex topic seem like we were finding the "God Particle".

As to his profit, I'm not sure how much he made off of each book, but the book is used across the world. The only reason I think any instructor would use his book is because it's a niche subject matter; the mechanics and theory of hydronic heating systems.

If Dr. Hydronics ever reads this--you're probally a nice guy, but you made a relatively simple subject complex. Funnel your sentences. Use numbers. Don't use unnessary words. KIS(keep it simple).

Re: Supreme Court sides with student in case over textbooks

#108

Post by SEMW »

saraid216 wrote: post #63
HarryHirsch wrote: post #17

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Publishers are merely exploiting the highly school-like nature of university education in the US. When I was in university, over in Europe, a long time ago, on the first day of lectures the professors would wheel in a cart of textbooks, saying these are suitable texts, go and pick the one that suits you best. But in the US, students demand that their education is like high school, with a set text and all, and if the…

> When I was in university, over in Europe, a long time ago, on the first day of lectures the professors would wheel in a cart of textbooks, saying these are suitable texts, go and pick the one that suits you best. o.O Seriously? How have I never heard that this happens? That's ridiculously sane.

As someone who goes to uni in Europe (the UK), I've never had anyone wheel in a an actual cart of textbooks, but nor have I ever had a lecturer proclaim only a single textbook is acceptable. Usually they give a list of 5-10, with a few of them being recommended. Even where they clearly prefer some particular textbook, they'll still name a few alternatives.

If a lecturer ever did say only a single textbook was allowed, a lot of people would laugh and ignore them (especially those people who prefer using library books to buying their own, since libraries don't usually stock enough copies of a single textbook). It's not like translating 'read chapter X for the tutorial on Y' into your chosen textbook is hard, that's what tables of contents are for.

I genuinely don't understand why all the US uni students in this thread talk about declarations by lecturers that some textbook is Required as if it was illegal to disobey. What am I missing here? It's not like the uni has any way of checking what you've bought, surely?

Re: Supreme Court sides with student in case over textbooks

#109

Post by potatolicious »

greenyoda wrote: post #18
UnoriginalGuy wrote: post #9

The publishers will just make sure to produce a different textbook between different regions now. Just re-order the chapters a little and re-order some questions/assignments. So even if someone ships in the foreign book it will be as useless as a previous edition. In general the whole textbook industry makes me sick. But fact is that lecturers are entirely responsible for it. The publishers can only do what the lectu…

The worst offenders are the professors who write their own textbooks (even though there are dozens of better ones already available) and then use them in their courses, making money off each student. Maybe there should be conflict of interest rules in universities. The heroes in this game are the instructors who are creating open-source textbooks.

I had a prof that did this. Except he sold his book through the school printhouse for $25, when the competing alternatives where all $200+.

It was hand-bound by some poor soul in the printing office and was clearly churned out with a laser printer, but it got the job done and saved everyone a bundle.

If the prof made some money off of this, I'm fine with that.

Re: Supreme Court sides with student in case over textbooks

#110

Post by abraxasz »

sib wrote: post #29
greenyoda wrote: post #18

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The worst offenders are the professors who write their own textbooks (even though there are dozens of better ones already available) and then use them in their courses, making money off each student. Maybe there should be conflict of interest rules in universities. The heroes in this game are the instructors who are creating open-source textbooks.

I had a professor who was a co-author on the textbook that we used in his class. It was the "standard" work in the field, so it would have been ridiculous to use a different one. Nonetheless, he acknowledged the potential conflict, gave us an accounting of his earnings per copy (well under a dollar per), and bought food for the class out of his own pocket. Good solution, I thought.

Had a somewhat similar story. Took a class whose instructor had written the reference book in the field. We used his textbook, but instead of having us buy it, he gave out free photocopies of the preprint for the yet-to-be released newest edition.
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