LibraryPirate.me: Torrent Site for Desperate Times
Soon a new college year will kick-start. This usually means that students must dig deep into their pockets to get the necessary study books, and they don’t come cheap. However, this situation is about change as a torrent administrator decided to educate the masses regardless of the deepness of their pockets.
The struggle of students to get a job in order to pay for college is an old issue.
“According to a study conducted by the Bureau of Labor Statistics, textbook prices have increased FOUR TIMES the rate of inflation of other finished goods for the period of 1990-2009,” the admin of LibraryPirate.me told TorrentFreak.
LibraryPirate’s (founded over a year ago) purpose is to help students by providing free textbooks from various domains.
“Our mission is simple and specific,” LP’s admin explains.
“To revolutionize the digital e-textbook industry and change it permanently.”
Real-world business rules shouldn’t be applied when it comes to textbook pricing, he believes. Not to mention the annual updates that make last year’s textbook obsolete, just as this year’s version – with its 6% annual price uplift – becomes the dictated choice.
“The Government Accountability Office reports that the average student spends about 00 on textbooks each year, or 26 percent of their yearly tuition [source, pdf]. Publishers defend their actions claiming increased expenses in updating this supplementary material are only being passed along to the student,” he explains.
“While there is a need to keep information current, most of what is taught in big introductory courses simply isn’t going to change that much from year to year, or even from decade to decade. For example, Calculus was invented 300 years ago however new editions of textbooks are released like clockwork.”
A monopoly on the market has been established and maintained by a small group of textbook publishers. They are also taking steps to maintain this power, discouraging student use of the pre-owned books market by offering discounts of 20% on their eBook products, but then disqualifying the purchaser from selling the product by implementing DRM.
“New Textbook legislation was introduced by the Higher Education Opportunity Act (H.R. 4137), which passed 380-49 in the House and 83-8 in the Senate on July 31. The bill was signed by President Obama on August 14 and went into effect July 1, 2010,” LP’s admin explains.
“The bill aims at making textbook publishers more up front with students about textbook pricing and also forces them to sell some additional course materials separately. While this is a start, it is clear now that these measures have done nothing to prevent the continued rise in inflation of textbooks and new digital course material.”
LibraryPirate’s admin goal is to put an end to this reign by creating, as he calls it, an open access movement.
“Open source textbooks alone will, without a doubt, turn the textbook industry on its head by taking away the power from the major publishing companies,” he explains.
“Those with access to e-textbook resources — students, librarians, scientists and professors have the responsibility to share this knowledge openly with the rest of the world. Unfortunately, the majority of universities do not utilize open source textbooks today. Professors continue to require students to buy hundreds of dollars in textbooks and ‘kiss the ring’ of textbook publishers.”
This has not yet become something solid so, for the moment, the students are left at the mercy of the textbook publishers. LP’s admin promises to soon meet the demands of such a task by making all textbooks open for everyone to use and distribute. LibraryPirate.me has already 1.000 textbooks indexed in its database and hopefully it will continue grow strong.
“Grab every textbook you can get your hands on and scan it so that everyone in the world can have a chance at education,” LP’s admin says.
“Professors, students, and avid readers alike, it is our responsibility to do everything we can to make education available to all who seek it, and this policy flies directly in the face of the textbook publishers that are using you to line their pockets.”
There are some ethical issues that come into play. Just as the students struggle to get their hands on the very books that help them making a career, publishers need to make money as well. But what is the moral difference between downloading a movie or a textbook, even if it’s offered at unfair prices through an anti-competitive monopoly?
“While many may view the open source movement as blatant ‘piracy’, I believe they are overlooking the obvious moral imperative at play here,” TorrentFreak was told.
“Personally, this notion became very clear to me after attending college and has remained the driving motivation behind the LibraryPirate project.”
“It’s no secret that college students today are simply victims of a broken educational system. Until real steps are taken to ensure textbook material is made more affordable and accessible to students, I only see one path to moral high ground.
“So, in the historical tradition of civil disobedience, the time has come for students to declare their opposition to this private theft of education,” LP’s admin concludes.