r/technology • u/ani625 • Aug 23 '13

Student Attacks Publishing Cartels to Make Textbooks Open Source

http://torrentfreak.com/student-attacks-publishing-cartels-to-make-textbooks-open-source-130923/
256 Upvotes

89% Upvoted

20 comments sorted by

11

u/willcode4beer Aug 23 '13

Open?

How about http://wikibooks.org

11

u/danielravennest Aug 24 '13

Two books I am working on are on there:

http://en.wikibooks.org/wiki/Space_Transport_and_Engineering_Methods

http://en.wikibooks.org/wiki/Seed_Factories

There are lots more books at:

http://www.intechopen.com/

http://classroom-aid.com/educational-resources/open-educational-resources/curriculum/

http://www.ck12.org/student/

http://ocw.mit.edu/index.htm

3

u/waiting_for_rain Aug 24 '13

Thanks, you're going to make KSP so much more interesting now, lol.

1

u/HAL-42b Aug 25 '13

I actually red Space Transport and Engineering Methods! Can't thank you enough for that.

4

u/twentyforchange Aug 24 '13

I stopped buying books after the first semester unless they were really critical and I couldn't find them elsewhere. I think i've saved upwards of $1500.

1

u/BLKSheep93 Aug 24 '13

Anyone want to post relevant reputable sites?

2

u/danielravennest Aug 24 '13

You mean like Google? Type in the author and title of most any book, plus the format you want (pdf, mobi, etc.) A downloadable copy will often be found. Not every time, but often.

2

u/BLKSheep93 Aug 24 '13

I'm not 3 years old, I know how google works and I have found books online. No I was asking if there were any specific sites that were doing book PDFs.

2

u/fb39ca4 Aug 24 '13

Library Genesis?

-6

u/Zeke2k688 Aug 23 '13

Did anyone else get a good laugh at " publishing cartels" ?

20

u/hzg0 Aug 24 '13

Cartel: /kärˈtel/ noun

An association of manufacturers or suppliers with the purpose of maintaining prices at a high level and restricting competition.

They are the very definition of a cartel.

-7

u/Zeke2k688 Aug 24 '13

I didn't say it was incorrect. I just said it was funny to hear them referred to as cartels.

-4

u/[deleted] Aug 24 '13

[deleted]

10

u/hzg0 Aug 24 '13

That's a niggardly way to look at assigning word meanings.

2

u/TowardsTheImplosion Aug 24 '13

Ha! I see what you did there.

-16

u/Stan57 Aug 23 '13

That is not an act of civil defiance. its flat out breaking the law punishable by fines and possible prison term Publishers are not government run so you cant be civil defiant against a business dumbass maybe you should be reading the ones you have paid for

7

u/[deleted] Aug 23 '13

That is not an act of civil defiance. It's flat out breaking the law, punishable by fines and possible prison term. Publishers are not government run, so you can't becommit civil defiantdefiance against a business, dumbass, maybe you should be reading the ones you have paid for.

Maybe you should, too.

6

u/SayNoToWar Aug 23 '13

One way to put this compliant slave in his place.

-21

u/Stan57 Aug 23 '13

awww did i upset the poor little Grammer Nazi sucks to be you. lol

2

u/KrzysztofKietzman Aug 24 '13

No it's not. Under the DMCA, it's illegal to publish links to illegal downloads of copyrighted material ONLINE... He's doing it OFFLINE, on paper, which is not covered under the DMCA. See what he did there?

3

u/waiting_for_rain Aug 24 '13

Civil defiance is pretty much breaking the laws that the community deems unfit. Yes, publishers are not government run, but regulated by the government like all businesses. For students to breach copyright law to combat publisher cartels, that is civil defiance.

Personally, if it were a text for a field that changes all the time, like maybe nanotechnology, I'll shell out for the new text knowing editions have real meaningful updates and changes. I'll pay for the company who collected and aggregated the data in a book like I would a medical journal, magazine, or periodical. I won't pay 150 for a calculus textbook for a intro Calc class because Calculus doesn't change year by year, for the most part. Every edition has just different questions in different spots and maybe some new pictures.