[ale] open source textbook bill

[Lightner, Jeff]

There's a comedian who talks about taking finance as a major in college.
He said it basically taught him to buy low and sell high.   He follows
up by saying the book he used for the course cost him $100 and the
campus bookstore bought it back for $3.  

 

________________________________

From: ale-bounces at ale.org [mailto:ale-bounces at ale.org] On Behalf Of Jim
Kinney
Sent: Wednesday, January 27, 2010 1:09 PM
To: Atlanta Linux Enthusiasts - Yes! We run Linux!
Subject: [ale] open source textbook bill

 

I stumbled across a notice for opensource textbooks being promoted at
the US senate level. 

I LIKE THIS!!!

http://www.govtrack.us/congress/billtext.xpd?bill=s111-1714

I found the link from here:
http://opensource.com/education/09/12/open-textbook-bill

As someone with a college student (OK - _2_ college students with the
spouse in grad school) I like the idea of making the big classes books
freely available. There is no need to purchase a math book (whose basic
content hasn't changed in 20 years) just to have it get superseded by an
"updated edition" that kills the used book resell price. Ditto on
freshman english, history, chemistry, physics, etc. Or the underhanded
process used by one school (which remain nameless as it's on Indian
Creek Dr and part of the University System of Georgia as a 2-year
school) to block students from getting their books from alternate
sources by not having the book-to-class data available until the day
before classes begin (when the data has been set in stone at least 3
months prior) which blocks students from buying used books from ebay and
amazon, etc. at less than half the price of the school bookstore.

-- 
-- 
James P. Kinney III
Actively in pursuit of Life, Liberty and Happiness
 
Proud partner. Susan G. Komen for the Cure.
 
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