17 October 2008

The High Price of College Textbooks

It's nothing new for college students to bring up the high cost of textbooks, but up until this week a website run by an anonymous student was giving students a break by providing pirated versions of their books.

The website, Textbook Torrent, was discovered by the publishers of the textbooks after a story was printed about the site in the Chronicle of Higher Education. Although the site's owner reluctantly shut down the site, he urged other to take his place against the publishers and start their own sites for illegal downloads.

What do you think about the high cost of textbooks?

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Comments

# Brandon Carpenter said:

I feel that the cost of college text books is outrageous. I don't feel that the anonymous student has done anything wrong at all. They know exactly how much is sucks to work hour after hour and then have to spend $200-300.00 per book. Why are publishers asking so much money for the books? Really... why?

That's one thing that really upsets me about the community college I attend in Illinois. Personally, my text books cost me anywhere from $100-280.00. Thats INSANE!!! Then later on I find out that after I purchased the book and attend class for that week, the teacher tells us we don't need the book. The teacher may also only look back at the book once or twice in the semester.

Looking back in the book once or twice isn't worth $100-$280.00 let alone $5.00. It's ridiculous and schools need to get a better grip on this situation. One way to fix the situation is either make your faculty use that book throughout the year or don't make it required for the students to purchase the books if it's not required by the teacher. Don't you think that would make much more sense?

Another thing....

If your school is going to do book buyback they that school/institution needs to give the students back more than $15-20.00 back for a $150.00 book.

So in my opinion I don't feel that the anonymous student has done anything illegal. Let that person go ahead and do it and help out their fellow students.

"b"

20 October 08 at 12:44 AM
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