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Online textbooks are the biggest scam on the planet.

Shawn

Shawn

Lifer
So my spanish 3 class requires that we rebuy a new edition spanish textbook online. We need to buy it in order to do the online homework assignments.

Because of that so I have to pay the full price of $117. This is for both the workbook and the online textbook. I can't just buy the workbook either, I have to buy both. Not only that, but I can't resell the book. What a fucking ripoff.
 
I'm sure you can find a PDF somewhere. 😉

Wish I would have thought of that when I was in college. I could of saved myself a couple grand.
 
A bigger scam than textbooks themselves? The whole textbook industry is absurd. One of my smallest hardcover textbooks in college was $200.
 
I spent over $600 for books this semester, I still have one to buy, (I'm waitlisted for the class) and already had one.

Accounting textbooks and the required working papers are fucking spendy.
 
Originally posted by: RedSquirrel
I'm sure you can find a PDF somewhere. 😉

Wish I would have thought of that when I was in college. I could of saved myself a couple grand.
Click to expand...

That's not the problem. I could use the old edition. It's that I have to register the books online or i can't do the online homework. Without the homework I'll fail the class.
 
Wow, sounds like a major scam. Great way to ensure the company doesn't compete against itself through students reselling their text books though. I'd still be pissed off.

Tell me the professor isn't one of the textbook's authors?
 
I used to work for a publisher - so I thank every semester that rolls around - a whole new batch of books with my boss' name gets purchased and he usually contacts me for some side work to "update" the book for the upcoming year so a new volume is put out 😀
 
Ooooh, so the textbook industry finally found a way to kill the used textbook market? Clever bunch of assholes they are. I managed to keep my textbook expenses down around $150 a semester in college thanks to a combination of buying used books, sharing books, or just not buying books for classes that I didn't think I'd need them for. I even created a rudimentary website where students could post and browse used books for sale, and I ended up selling it to my college, so I might have even come out ahead on books in college. :Q
 
Originally posted by: Shawn
Originally posted by: RedSquirrel
I'm sure you can find a PDF somewhere. 😉

Wish I would have thought of that when I was in college. I could of saved myself a couple grand.
Click to expand...

That's not the problem. I could use the old edition. It's that I have to register the books online or i can't do the online homework. Without the homework I'll fail the class.
Click to expand...

Can you get the questions without registering? If not, do you have a buddy who has registered?

Get the questions and do them and hand them in by email or hard copy. If the Prof refuses, tell the dept head. Most (all?) colleges and universities have policies that prevent instructors from discriminating based on the method HW is handed in, provided you're not doing something ridiculous. Hell, say you can't afford it and the school may pay for it for you if the prof refuses to back down.
 
Originally posted by: sactoking
Originally posted by: Shawn
Originally posted by: RedSquirrel
I'm sure you can find a PDF somewhere. 😉

Wish I would have thought of that when I was in college. I could of saved myself a couple grand.
Click to expand...

That's not the problem. I could use the old edition. It's that I have to register the books online or i can't do the online homework. Without the homework I'll fail the class.
Click to expand...

Can you get the questions without registering? If not, do you have a buddy who has registered?

Get the questions and do them and hand them in by email or hard copy. If the Prof refuses, tell the dept head. Most (all?) colleges and universities have policies that prevent instructors from discriminating based on the method HW is handed in, provided you're not doing something ridiculous. Hell, say you can't afford it and the school may pay for it for you if the prof refuses to back down.
Click to expand...


Not necessarily. My accounting professors refuse homework if it's done on photocopied pages from the working papers all the time. It's a copyright violation and it's illegal. They are within their rights to refuse such work turned in...on the other hand, if I do the work in Excel on forms I generate myself, it's fine.

Textbooks are a scam...everyone admits it...but no one can come up with a reasonable solution.

Look at math textbooks. Every year there's a new version...have the fucking numbers changed since last year?
It only takes a minor revision to the text for the publishers to justify a new printing...and often, the schools have contractural obligations to use them...but not always.

There's a certain amount of "kickbacks" that occur between the book publisher/sellers and the various educational institutions. Not necessarily illegal, but often not exactly ethical...(free teacher's editions, free seminars, etc.)
SOME instructors refuse to play the games and continue to use older textbooks just to help keep costs down. Others don't care.
 
yeah, that sounds like a rip. but they got to pay for their health care.

that was the reason my Homeowner's Association gave when they raised their rates.
 
Sounds like quite the bull headed setup.

I don't even get why they still use text books these days. They are a total waste of trees and money. A typical textbook is outdated months after it's released. Technology changes too fast to make it worth putting any of it on paper.
 
bah. i had an intro business class last year and the teacher wanted to use the online material...but so many of us already had used books and pitched a fit that she didnt 🙂
 
Originally posted by: tmc
what a ripoff. this completely kills used books market if implemented fully.
Click to expand...
I could totally see that backfiring on them, though. If publishers went all digital it would probably be a boon for piracy. Any DRM would eventually be cracked and copies easily redistributed. Physical textbooks are more expensive to produce and they lose money with the used book market, but piracy isn't as issue because digitizing them is not very practical.
 
1) I'd rather have a physical textbook than some crap online copy. I don't really like to read long articles on my computer.
2) Having to register the book or whatever to do the homework is also crap.

I paid only $65 for books this quarter -bought an inorganic chemistry textbook and a thermodynamics textbook; both were international editions (one new from Abebooks.com and one used from a friend). I technically didn't even have to buy them, as the books are on reserve in the library, so I can check them out for 2 hours at a time.
 
Originally posted by: frostedflakes
Originally posted by: tmc
what a ripoff. this completely kills used books market if implemented fully.
Click to expand...
I could totally see that backfiring on them, though. If publishers went all digital it would probably be a boon for piracy. Any DRM would eventually be cracked and copies easily redistributed. Physical textbooks are more expensive to produce and they lose money with the used book market, but piracy isn't as issue because digitizing them is not very practical.
Click to expand...

Read the thread. He has online homework assignments that require a one-use code at the publisher's website. No DRM, no chance to pirate.
 
Originally posted by: Deeko
A bigger scam than textbooks themselves? The whole textbook industry is absurd. One of my smallest hardcover textbooks in college was $200.
Click to expand...

International editions FTW, I stopped buying hardcover books years ago.

My accounting books were all published by the professors and the notes were inside too, so you can take notes on them. All in all not a bad set up, it was only like $30-40 a pop
 
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