I remember coming to US to go to High School then to University and noticed the books huge, heavy things. Full of pictures and shiny pages, yet content sucked and was spread out unnecessarily. Everything could have been condensed to a 1/3 or 1/4 size. Then when I got to University also happened to notice they cost an arm and a leg.
So I was thinking, I'll just sell them back when I am done and get the money back. Nope, it cost only a small fraction of original price I paid. Because a new version was out already.
Ever since I consider publishers of those books scam artists and crooks. In college I had a meager stipend, and only later got a job on campus for minimum wage -- I had work extra hours at night to make sure to have enough for next quarter when an unpredictable (but high) amount of money would be needed to pay for books.
Amen on the content being awful. I'm in school right now, and have noticed a distinctly inverse relationship between the size of the textbook and the clarity of its instruction.
Imagine you're the author, and you have to explain derivatives in 100 pages, because your boss asked you to make the book 1000+ pages long. Including definitions, formulas, examples, and problems, you could get to 30 pages. You'd think it's impossible to write 70pp of padding, yet somehow they make it happen...
So students are double the victims: they pay through the nose, and they get 100pp of crappy explanations, where 30pp would do.
So I was thinking, I'll just sell them back when I am done and get the money back. Nope, it cost only a small fraction of original price I paid. Because a new version was out already.
Ever since I consider publishers of those books scam artists and crooks. In college I had a meager stipend, and only later got a job on campus for minimum wage -- I had work extra hours at night to make sure to have enough for next quarter when an unpredictable (but high) amount of money would be needed to pay for books.