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High prices make textbook ‘piracy’ acceptable to most students

torrentfreak.com

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Re: High prices make textbook ‘piracy’ acceptable to most students

#121

Post by nervousvarun »

bredren wrote: post #110
polishdude20 wrote: post #53

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yeah it seems to be a very prevalent thing in the world. We exploit 20 something year olds new found freedom and cashflows. This is the first time they are making money and are looking to be independent and "grown up" or "find themselves" so the market says "hey, I'll help you find yourself if you give me money." Young people have a natural sense of invisibility. "I can do anything I set my mind to" has been burned i…

This is done around all key stages of life where insecurities can be exploited. The wedding industry from wedding rings to venues, new babies, even interviewing for white collar jobs used to be accompanied with the need for a new suit. Once it can be established something is important and to be revered, rent seeking knows no bounds.

All true and don't forget that even death you're not safe (the funeral industry is one of the worst offenders).

Re: High prices make textbook ‘piracy’ acceptable to most students

#122

Post by nervousvarun »

AHOHA wrote: post #99
loeg wrote: post #77

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Where can I get one of these 70 year mortgages?

Canada, of course!(1) (1) https://vm.tiktok.com/ZMYEGwwSD/

Wow...tiktok is blocked for me at work...is that fixed rate or ARM financing?

Re: High prices make textbook ‘piracy’ acceptable to most students

#123

Post by ddingus »

giantg2 wrote: post #60
jwie wrote: post #43

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I did more or less. I said I’m the instructor of record I can decide how I take assignments. Next thing was “paperless” complaints. I was “using too much paper.” After a little back and forth they got tired of me, handed me a degree and told me to leave. I think what really irked them was other students found out and started demanding it from all the real professors and adjuncts and in other contexts. Then I was an a…

"Then I was an actual problem not just a troublemaker." Maybe I'm weird, but this sounds like the highest form of compliment.

Nope. I see it the same way. Perhaps we are both weird then.

Re: High prices make textbook ‘piracy’ acceptable to most students

#124

Post by AHOHA »

nervousvarun wrote: post #122
AHOHA wrote: post #99

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Canada, of course!(1) (1) https://vm.tiktok.com/ZMYEGwwSD/

Wow...tiktok is blocked for me at work...is that fixed rate or ARM financing?

Here’s the video https://files.catbox.moe/rpp5fp.mp4

Re: High prices make textbook ‘piracy’ acceptable to most students

#125

Post by newsclues »

kelseyfrog wrote: post #8

Here's a weird idea. Bundle materials into tuition expenses. It incentivizes the right people with the power and market participation to optimize for the right thing. Presumably, teachers and departments would have to justify costs from a materials budget to an admin forcing real downward pressure on the textbook market. The current state of textbooks acts like a surprise fee(dark pattern) where you purchase a produc…

> Here's a weird idea. Bundle materials into tuition expenses.

As a former textbook seller, professors will exploit this for profit by publishing their own textbook at inflated prices and collecting a nice reward. This does happen in some places (or did, I'm out of the industry).

Imagine if every state or country developed their own open source curriculum, instead of allowing publishers to exists as owners and gatekeepers of knowledge.

Re: High prices make textbook ‘piracy’ acceptable to most students

#126

Post by newsclues »

Aeolun wrote: post #35
jwie wrote: post #25

It’s so much worse than you think. Many textbooks come with license keys specifically so you can’t buy used books anymore. Students who do buy a used book are typically coerced into buying the license key to do digital homework, or whatever other reason. When I was teaching during a graduate fellowship I accepted paper assignments for students who bought used books, or who shared books with other students. The Pearso…

Why wouldn’t the dean tell them to go pound sand? Does Pearson do anything for the university except extracting money?

Publishers have a sales force that courts and encourages (bribes) academics and administrators. They fund conferences and provide jobs (writing textbooks).

It's a patronage network that exploits young people.

Re: High prices make textbook ‘piracy’ acceptable to most students

#127

Post by newsclues »

flybrand wrote: post #72
cmurf wrote: post #40

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm not sure the situation calls for such diplomatic language. You are fucking with this company's fief. There, that's what's really going on. They feel entitled to earning money and are pissed they need any customers at all to get it. Public libraries are now paying more money per use for licensing fees than an individual would pay. Libraries are pretty much looking into the abyss, no more permanent copies of anythi…

Yes, this is the right issue - it's their fief. They're farming money off the students. Don't mess with the crop, even if you are the crop.

Is this the sort of sustainable business that our governments are encouraging?

Re: High prices make textbook ‘piracy’ acceptable to most students

#128

Post by analog31 »

One of my relatives attends a public university that rents textbooks to students. At the end of the year they're returned. If a new edition comes out, the university eats the cost. As I understand it, some of the books are available as downloads, and in other cases teachers accept the use of old editions.

Re: High prices make textbook ‘piracy’ acceptable to most students

#129

Post by mauvia »

Copying textbooks is explicitly legal in India as part of case law, as "fair dealing". This was decided in 2016 and involved Oxford University Press and Cambridge University press, so the opponents were pretty powerful overall.

https://www.thehindu.com/news/cities/Delhi/University-copyin...

Wiki article because the hindu is paywalled: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/University_of_Oxford_v._Ramesh...

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