DailyDirt: Those Who Can, Write Textbooks...

Textbooks are surprisingly expensive items. The classic example is an introductory math textbook: where the math hasn't changed significantly for over a hundred years, but the price of the newest edition seems to suggest that there should be a lot of new material added to the book. Sure, there's a used book market -- and even rental books nowadays -- but the trend of rising textbook prices has some students and faculty questioning some of the publishing industry's practices.

• The Supreme Court upheld that anyone, particularly Supap Kirtsaeng, can buy textbooks in Asia and re-sell them for a nice profit in the US -- thanks to the first sale doctrine. Kirtsaeng won his case, but he didn't get his copyright-holding opponents to pay for his legal bills. That could change, though, if the Supreme Court decides in his favor again. [url]
• There are some obvious problems when professors try to use cheaper textbooks as teaching materials -- including pissing off the authors who might be in positions of authority at the school. Should academic freedom allow a professor to chose a different textbook from his/her colleagues? Will the racket of monotonically increasing textbook prices continue? [url]
• The 'Integral House' in Canada is up for sale -- once owned by math professor James Stewart. The calculus textbooks authored by Stewart have raked in many, many millions from college students over the years, but if you have a few million yourself to spare, you can buy this math-inspired house (which looks like it comes with a library of math books). [url]

After you've finished checking out those links, take a look at our Daily Deals for cool gadgets and other awesome stuff.

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