EDITORIAL

It’s that time of year, again. We couldn’t wait for Christmas break to come and end the 16-week chain of papers, projects, exams, and staring at the clock during lectures.

The final exams came and went and so did book-buy-back, leaving many of us with empty pockets and a backpack full of books we couldn’t wait to be rid of.

What exactly is the problem with these companies that publish these textbooks that come out with a new edition every two years. Do things like basic mathematics, history, and British and American literature really change so dramatically that every two years, a "new" textbook is necessary?

BURN BABY BURN:
In protest, a pile of non-
returnable books burns in an
ashtray outside of the college.

Upon inspection of these "new" textbooks we found that the only real difference is that the chapters are shuffled into a different order, and a snappy new cover is added. These upgrades add little, if any, new information to what are primarily traditional teachings. Things like Shakespeare haven’t changed in over four hundred years, but for some reason we keep buying copy after copy hidden by a new index or glossary format.

Who do we have to blame for such an atrocity? The IVCC bookstore? Though it may seem easy to forward your hatred to the cashier that just emptied your wallet, keep in mind that the bookstore doesn’t crank those books out of a press in the back room; they get them from publishing companies.

These companies only earn profits from the initial sale of the book. They don’t turn a constant profit if the same amount of books stay in circulation; they make their money from those "new" books, making the current edition obsolete.