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Weiye Loh

Skepticblog » Why are textbooks so expensive? - 0 views

  • In some cases, the costs are driven up because the market has gotten highly competitive with more and expensive features, like pricey full color throughout, and lots of ancillaries (website for the book, CD-ROM of Powerpoints or images, study guide for students, instructor’s guide, test banks, and many other extras). In the high-volume markets, like the introductory courses taken by hundreds of non-majors, these silly extras seem to make a big difference in enticing faculty to change their preferences and adopt a different book, so publishers must pull out all the stops on these expensive frills or lose in a highly competitive market. And, like any other market, the cost per unit is a function of how many you sell. In the huge introductory markets, there are tens of thousands of copies sold, and they can afford to keep their prices competitive but still must add every possible bell and whistle to lure instructors to adopt them. But in the upper-level undergraduate or the graduate courses, where there may only be a few hundred or a few thousand copies sold each year, they cannot afford expensive color, and each copy must be priced to match the anticipated sales. Low volume = higher individual cost per unit. It’s simple economics.
  • the real culprit is something most students don’t suspect: used book recyclers, and students’ own preferences for used books that are cheaper and already marked with someone else’s highlighter marker!
  • As an author, I’ve seen how the sales histories of textbooks work. Typically they have a big spike of sales for the first 1-2 years after they are introduced, and that’s when most the new copies are sold and most of the publisher’s money is made. But by year 3  (and sometimes sooner), the sales plunge and within another year or two, the sales are miniscule. The publishers have only a few options in a situation like this. One option: they can price the book so that the first two years’ worth of sales will pay their costs back before the used copies wipe out their market, which is the major reason new copies cost so much. Another option (especially with high-volume introductory textbooks) is to revise it within 2-3 years after the previous edition, so the new edition will drive all the used copies off the shelves for another two years or so. This is also a common strategy. For my most popular books, the publisher expected me to be working on a new edition almost as soon as the previous edition came out, and 2-3 years later, the new edition (with a distinctive new cover, and sometimes with significant new content as well) starts the sales curve cycle all over again. One of my books is in its eighth edition, but there are introductory textbooks that are in the 15th or 20th edition.
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  • For over 20 years now, I’ve heard all sorts of prophets saying that paper textbooks are dead, and predicting that all textbooks would be electronic within a few years. Year after year, I  hear this prediction—and paper textbooks continue to sell just fine, thank you.  Certainly, electronic editions of mass market best-sellers, novels and mysteries (usually cheaply produced with few illustrations) seem to do fine as Kindle editions or eBooks, and that market is well established. But electronic textbooks have never taken off, at least in science textbooks, despite numerous attempts to make them work. Watching students study, I have a few thoughts as to why this is: Students seem to feel that they haven’t “studied” unless they’ve covered their textbook with yellow highlighter markings. Although there are electronic equivalents of the highlighter marker pen, most of today’s students seem to prefer physically marking on a real paper book. Textbooks (especially science books) are heavy with color photographs and other images that don’t often look good on a tiny screen, don’t print out on ordinary paper well, but raise the price of the book. Even an eBook is going to be a lot more expensive with lots of images compared to a mass-market book with no art whatsoever. I’ve watched my students study, and they like the flexibility of being able to use their book just about anywhere—in bright light outdoors away from a power supply especially. Although eBooks are getting better, most still have screens that are hard to read in bright light, and eventually their battery will run out, whether you’re near a power supply or not. Finally, if  you drop your eBook or get it wet, you have a disaster. A textbook won’t even be dented by hard usage, and unless it’s totally soaked and cannot be dried, it does a lot better when wet than any electronic book.
  • A recent study found that digital textbooks were no panacea after all. Only one-third of the students said they were comfortable reading e-textbooks, and three-fourths preferred a paper textbook to an e-textbook if the costs were equal. And the costs have hidden jokers in the deck: e-textbooks may seem cheaper, but they tend to have built-in expiration dates and cannot be resold, so they may be priced below paper textbooks but end up costing about the same. E-textbooks are not that much cheaper for publishers, either, since the writing, editing, art manuscript, promotion, etc., all cost the publisher the same whether the final book is in paper or electronic. The only cost difference is printing and binding and shipping and storage vs. creating the electronic version.
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    But in the 1980s and 1990s, the market changed drastically with the expansion of used book recyclers. They set up shop at the bookstore door near the end of the semester and bought students' new copies for pennies on the dollar. They would show up in my office uninvited and ask if I want to sell any of the free adopter's copies that I get from publishers trying to entice me. If you walk through any campus bookstore, nearly all the new copies have been replaced by used copies, usually very tattered and with broken spines. The students naturally gravitate to the cheaper used books (and some prefer them because they like it if a previous owner has highlighted the important stuff). In many bookstores, there are no new copies at all, or just a few that go unsold. What these bargain hunters don't realize is that every used copy purchased means a new copy unsold. Used copies pay nothing to the publisher (or the author, either), so to recoup their costs, publishers must price their new copies to offset the loss of sales by used copies. And so the vicious circle begins-publisher raises the price on the book again, more students buy used copies, so a new copy keeps climbing in price.
Audrey B

Electronic Civil Disobedience and the World Wide Web of Hacktivism: - 1 views

  • In the spring of 1998, a young British hacker known as "JF" accessed about 300 web sites and placed anti-nuclear text and imagery. He entered, changed and added HTML code. At that point it was the biggest political hack of its kind. Since then, and increasingly over the course of the year, there were numerous reports of web sites being accessed and altered with political content.
  • By no means was 1998 the first year of the browser wars, but it was the year when electronic civil disobedience and hacktivism came to the fore, evidenced by a front page New York Times article on the subject by the end of October. Since then the subject has continued to move through the media sphere.
  • computerized activism, grassroots infowar, electronic civil disobedience, politicized hacking, and resistance to future war
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  • these five portals seem to provide a useful starting point for a more in-depth, yet to come, examination of the convergence of activism, art, and computer-based communication and media.
  • PeaceNet enabled - really for the first time - political activists to communicate with one another across international borders with relative ease and speed.
  • The international role of email communication, coupled to varying degrees with the use of the Fax machine, was highlighted in both the struggles of pro-democracy Chinese students and in broader trans-national movements that lead to the dissolution of the Soviet Union.
  • the role of international email communication in linking together the world.
  • an overarching dominant paradigm that privileges discourse, dialogue, discussion and open and free access.
  • So the first portal of Computerized Activism is important for understanding the roots of today’s extraparliamentarian,
  • Computerized activism, defined more purely as the use of the Internet infrastructure as a means for activists to communicate with one another, across international borders or not, is less threatening to power than the other types of uses we see emerging in which the Internet infrastructure is not only a means toward or a site for communication, but the Internet infrastructure itself becomes an object or site for action.
    • Audrey B
       
      Twitter, YouTube, other forms of social networking that provide communication within the Internet infrastructure to become an "object or site for action"...
  • Infowar here refers to a war of words, a propaganda war. Grassroots infowar is the first step, the first move away from the Internet as just a site for communication and the beginning of the transformation from word to deed.
  • emerge fully cognizant they are on a global stage, telepresent across borders, in many locations simultaneously.
  • a desire to push words towards action. Internet media forms become vehicles for inciting action as opposed to simply describing or reporting.
  • war of words
  • war of words
  • war of words
  • lists, newsgroups, discussion lists, and web sites
  • A primary distinction, then, between earlier forms of computerized activism and forms of grassroots infowar is in the degree of intensity. Coupled with that is the degree to which the participants are noticed and seen as a force.
  • in grassroots infowar comes the desire to incite action and the ability to do so at a global scale.
  • Within a matter of days there were protests and actions at Mexican consulates and embassies all over the world
  • At the end of 1997, news of the Acteal massacre in Chiapas, in which 45 indigenous people were killed, quickly spread through global pro-Zapatista Internet networks.
  • following there has been a shift, the beginning of the move toward accepting the Internet infrastructure as both a channel for communication and a site for action.
    • Audrey B
       
      channel for communication=computerized activism. a Site for action= grassroots infowar...Combining the two leads to Electronic Civil Disobedience
  • tactics of trespass and blockade from these earlier social movements and are experimentally applying them to the Internet.
  • A typical civil disobedience tactic has been for a group of people to physically blockade, with their bodies, the entranceways of an opponent's office or building or to physically occupy an opponent's office -- to have a sit-in.
  • utilizes virtual blockades and virtual sit-ins
  • an ECD actor can participate in virtual blockades and sit-ins from home, from work, from the university, or from other points of access to the Net.
  • a theoretical exploration of how to move protests from the streets onto the Internet.
  • street protest, on-the-ground disruptions and disturbance of urban infrastructure and they hypothesize how such practices can be applied to the Internet infrastructure
  • after the 1997 Acteal Massacre in Chiapas, there was a shift toward a more hybrid position that views the Internet infrastructure as both a means for communication and a site for direct action.
  • Electronic Civil Disobedience is the first transgression, making Politicized Hacking the second transgression and Resistance to Future War the third.
  • The realization and legitimization of the Internet infrastructure as a site for word and deed opens up new possibilities for Net politics, especially for those already predisposed to extraparliamentarian and direct action social movement tactics.
  • In early 1998 a small group calling themselves the Electronic Disturbance Theater had been watching other people experimenting with early forms of virtual sit-ins. The group then created software called FloodNet and on a number of occasions has invited mass participation in its virtual sit-ins against the Mexican government.
  • FloodNet to direct a "symbolic gesture" against an opponent's web site.
  • it launched a three-pronged FloodNet disturbance against web sites of the Mexican presidency, the Frankfurt Stock Exchange, and the Pentagon, to demonstrate international support for the Zapatistas, against the Mexican government, against the U.S. military, and against a symbol of international capital.
  • hacks into Mexican government web sites where political messages have been added to those sites.
  • the young British hacker named "JF" who hacked into around 300 web sites world wide and placed anti-nuclear imagery and text. This method has been tried by a number of groups.
  • while ECD actors don’t hide their names, operating freely and above board, most political hacks are done by people who wish to remain anonymous. It is also likely political hacks are done by individuals rather than by specific groups.
  • As already stated there are critiques aimed at the effectiveness and the appropriateness of cyber-protests. In terms of effectiveness, three closely related types of questions have appeared regarding political, tactical, and technical effectiveness. Concerning appropriateness there are ethical questions, that may be also considered as political questions, and of course there are legal questions. Some of the legal concerns raise issues of enforceability and prosecuteability.
  • Are these methods of computerized activism effective?
  • If the desired goal of hacktivism is to draw attention to particular issues by engaging in actions that are unusual and will attract some degree of media coverage, then effectiveness can be seen as being high.
  • Rather hacktivism appears to be a means to augment or supplement existing organizing efforts, a way to make some noise and focus attention.
  • a period of expansion, rather than contraction.
  • To judge blocking a web site, or clogging the pipelines leading up to a web site, is to take an ethical position. If the judgement goes against such activity, such an ethical position is likely to be derived from an ethical code that values free and open access to information.
  • While it is true that some forms of hacktivity are fairly easy to see as being outside the bounds of law - such as entering into systems to destroy data - there are other forms that are more ambiguous and hover much closer to the boundary between the legal and the illegal. Coupled with this ambiguity are other factors that tend to cloud the enforceability or prosecuteability of particular hacktivist offenses. Jurisdictional factors are key here. The nature of cyberspace is extraterritorial. People can easily act across geographic political borders, as those borders do not show themselves in the terrain. Law enforcement is still bound to particular geographic zones. So there is a conflict between the new capabilities of political actors and the old system to which the law is still attached. This is already beginning to change and legal frameworks, at the international level, will be mapped on to cyberspace.
  • It seems that hacktivity has met and will meet resistance from many quarters. It doesn't seem as if opposition to hacktivist ideas and practices falls along particular ideological lines either.
  • hacktivism represents a spectrum of possibilities that exists in some combination of word and deed.
  • What remains unclear about hacktivism emerges when we start to ask questions like: what does this mean and where is this going?
    • Audrey B
       
      Twitter. At 3:30 people log/hack on to Twitter and form blockades so that Iranians can voice their beliefs and feelings towards the government in 140 characters. People are also hacking and creating proxy sites that allow Iranians to get online.
  • Theorizing about grassroots or bottom-up Information Warfare doesn't nearly get as much attention as the dominant models and as a consequence there is not much written on the subject. 11 The case of the global pro-Zapatista networks of solidarity and resistance offers a point of departure for further examination of grassroots infowar. One feature of Zapatista experience over the course of the last 5 years is that it has been a war of words, as opposed to a prolonged military conflict. This is not to say there isn't a strong Mexican military presence in the state of Chiapas. Quite the contrary is true. But fighting technically ended on January 12, 1994 and since then there has been a ceasefire and numerous attempts at negotiation.12 What scholars, activists, and journalists, on both the left and the right, have said is that the Zapatistas owe their survival at this point largely to a war of words. This war of words, in part, is the propaganda war that has been successfully unleashed by Zapatista leaders like Subcommandante Marcos as well as non-Zapatista supporters throughout Mexico and the world. Such propaganda and rhetoric has, of course, been transmitted through more traditional mass communication means, like through the newspaper La Jornada. 13 But quite a substantial component of this war of words has taken place on the Internet. Since January 1, 1994 there has been an explosion of the Zapatista Internet presence in the forms of email Cc:
  • Because of the more secret, private, low key, and anonymous nature of the politicized hacks, this type of activity expresses a different kind of politics. It is not the politics of mobilization, nor the politics that requires mass participation. This is said not to pass judgement, but to illuminate that there are several important forms of direct action Net politics already being shaped.
  • hackers' desires to make information free.
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    Concrete article for paper
Gideon Burton

Technological singularity - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia - 0 views

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    This ties into the theme of artificial intelligence in Vernor Vinge's Rainbow's End
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    Guys this is the bomb. Check it out or die!
Ashley Nelson

Unleash Your Imagination - FanFiction.Net - 0 views

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    A website that is dedicated to making sure that you got the ending you wanted to your favorite show. People can write and make up stories using characters that have already been created like Harry Potter or Batman.
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    This is the site that I refer to in my blog.
Ben Wagner

Ravings of a Feral Genius: "Life's A Joy That Has To End": John Hannah, Rest In Peace - 0 views

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    Roger Ebert tweeted this link earlier and I found it especially poignant. How do we grieve or even find out when people we only know online pass away?
Ben Wagner

Tommy Peters' Bicycles: The Wisdom Of Crowds * James Surowiecki - 0 views

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    Came across this while searching in Google Blogs, this blogger tries to relate principles from "The Widsom of Crowds" to the never-ending Mac vs. PC debate
Ashley Nelson

Vernor Vinge-Entire Book? - 2 views

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    I think I found the entire Vernor Vinge's Rainbows End online. It looks like it is all here. I wish I found this a week ago!
annald

Ambiant Intelligence Free Online course - 1 views

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    I haven't been through this yet, but there are clear connection with Rainbows End, and it sounds interesting.
Krista S

Report: Mafia Wars, Farmville Creator Scammed Player - 1 views

  • The man who created some of the most popular social networking games on Facebook is admitting he "did every horrible thing in the book just to get revenues," according to Consumerist.com.
  • Some of the spam ends up as malware and adware installed on your computer that can be impossible to remove. Others leave players with a monthly $9.99 credit card charge that they may not even be aware they subscribed to.
Weiye Loh

Victorian Literature, Statistically Analyzed With New Process - NYTimes.com - 1 views

  • A decline in references to “God,” “Christian” and “universal” is consonant with the conventional view that the 19th century was a time of rising secularism and skepticism.
  • Yet large searches can also challenge some pet theories of close reading, he said: for example, that the Victorians were obsessed with the nature and origins of evil. As it turns out, books with the word “evil” in the title bumped along near the bottom of the graph, accounting for less than 0.1 percent — a thousandth — of those published during the Victorian era.
  • As Mr. Cohen is quick to acknowledge, the meaning of those numbers is anything but clear. Perhaps authors didn’t like to use the word “evil” in the title; perhaps there were other, more common synonyms; perhaps the context points to another subject altogether.
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  • Ms. Martin at Princeton knows firsthand how electronic searches can unearth both obscure texts and dead ends. She has spent the last 10 years compiling a list of books, newspaper and journal articles about the technical aspects of poetry. She recalled finding a sudden explosion of the words “syntax” and “prosody” in 1832, suggesting a spirited debate about poetic structure. But it turned out that Dr. Syntax and Prosody were the names of two racehorses.
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    A decline in references to "God," "Christian" and "universal" is consonant with the conventional view that the 19th century was a time of rising secularism and skepticism.
Ben M

BBC NEWS | Technology | Berners-Lee on the read/write web - 1 views

  • Well in some ways. The idea was that anybody who used the web would have a space where they could write and so the first browser was an editor, it was a writer as well as a reader. Every person who used the web had the ability to write something. It was very easy to make a new web page and comment on what somebody else had written, which is very much what blogging is about.
  • For years I had been trying to address the fact that the web for most people wasn't a creative space; there were other editors, but editing web pages became difficult and complicated for people. What happened with blogs and with wikis, these editable web spaces, was that they became much more simple. When you write a blog, you don't write complicated hypertext, you just write text, so I'm very, very happy to see that now it's gone in the direction of becoming more of a creative medium.
  • I feel that we need to individually work on putting good things on it, finding ways to protect ourselves from accidentally finding the bad stuff, and that at the end of the day, a lot of the problems of bad information out there, things that you don't like, are problems with humanity.
    • Heather D
       
      This reminds me of how I think the Church uses these tools. Yes, the internet can be used for not-so-good things...but ultimately, it can be used and is meant to be used to expand the Church's work.
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  • My hope is that it'll be very positive in bringing people together around the planet, because it'll make communication between different countries more possible.
    • Ben M
       
      Reminds me of Robert and his ham radio friends all over the world
  • building of something very new and special,
    • Ben M
       
      a cathedral!
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    The man who launched the very first website talks about the way blogs and wikis have realized his initial vision of the web as a space for participatory creativity (and writing in particular)
Rachael Schiel

World to end on Saturday, say New York preachers - Yahoo! News - 1 views

  • "You've committed your life to Jesus. You know you're saved. But when the Rapture comes, what's to become of your loving pets who are left behind?" Eternal Earth-Bound Pets says on its website, offering to "take that burden off your mind." The post-doomsday pet rescue service already has 259 clients, who have paid $135 for the first pet and $20 for each additional pet at the same address, to ensure the faithful animal companions are looked after and loved even when their Christian owners have gone to the other side.
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    If you are pretty sure you will be caught up into the rapture on Saturday, your pets can still be taken care of if you pay $135 to Eternal Earth-Bound Pets
Sam McGrath

H. P. Lovecraft - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia - 0 views

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    This related to a blog I just did. Go to themes. The first one is Forbidden Knowledge. He was mentioned in Rainbows End too.
Sam McGrath

The H.P. Lovecraft Archive - 0 views

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    Some stuff on H. P. Lovecraft. I wrote a blog mentioning him and he is also briefly mentioned in Rainbows End.
Sam McGrath

DNA/The Private Life of Genghis Khan - 2 views

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    A treat for anyone who's read the Hitchhiker series.
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    For everyone who's read the Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy. This is a great short story by Adams that ties in something from the books. If you haven't read the books you might not get the punch line at the end of the story. Enjoy
Gideon Burton

Vernor Vinge - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia - 0 views

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    Bio of the author of the novel we are reading
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    I noticed he was a professor at SDSU, the setting for much of Rainbows End
Sam McGrath

Participate on evly.com - 0 views

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    This is specifically for crowdsourcing. It seems like the first step toward what is describe in Rainbows End. The idea of this type of social network is kind of exciting.
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