While certainly unethical, the increasingly popular practice of pirating expensive textbooks shouldn't surprise anyone.
After all, students pay hundreds of dollars each semester for books they may open only a few times. And each new edition reduces the value of older ones. Often, $300 textbooks resell for less than half their original price when the next edition comes out.
While cheaper digital versions may help, textbook publishers need to embrace new measures to help students afford their products.
Closer to home, the Penn Bookstore could take some of the burden off students.
By buying back old editions, the bookstore could return more money to students when budgets are most strained. Measures like these would allow the bookstore to offer a higher quantity of used textbooks each semester - an important resource for cash-strapped students.
Professors can also help out by allowing online access to their syllabi or book lists earlier in the summer and winter. Comparison-shopping for textbooks only works well when students have enough time to get them shipped before classes start. No one likes to order a used book from specialized websites if the first quiz is scheduled in a week or two.
As textbook publishers adjust to the cheaper distribution provided by new media, Penn also needs to move more quickly to relieve students of such a costly yoke.
Improving access to used books is the first step in this process.
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