According to a recent study (involving the WordPress Stats plugin for bavatuesdays), students searching for textbook torrents has seen a dramatic rise as of late. In little over 24 hours Google searches for the term “Textbook Torrents” on the bava have increased almost 150%. During these tough times it seems that students are looking for alternative methods of securing their textbooks, and avoiding those lofty (or is it inflated?) sticker prices. Take a look for yourself:
Today
What does this all mean? Well, a few things:
- Students are returning to their colleges and universities and have a good idea of what books they will need for this coming semester;
- they don’t want to pay the exorbitant prices they are being asked;
- textbook publishers may soon be following in the footsteps of the RIAA, and engaging in higher profile “crack downs” on students, which means this is all just getting fun.
But Rev, what kind of 1960’s dance party would YOU throw for a medieval king?
I suspect you’re right about step 3. Textbook publishers are worse than Microsoft, with their planned-obsolete books that are replaced by a new edition each year. And the schools that put new editions of textbooks on their syllabi are complicit. Or even worse, they make it so that students can’t buy used because the online components of the textbook can only be used by one student. And of course, the prices go up, while the quality stays the same, or goes down. It’s awful.