Ebooks Are Not As Expensive

Reading today is a lot different then it was in the year 868 AD; when the first book was published in China. You know a written or printed work consisting of pages glued or sewn together along one side and bound in covers. Society today is so advanced that everything we do is constantly changing whether we realize it or not. For example, the book, before people would go to a bookstore or library to get the books they were interested in. Today society is making fewer trips to the bookstore and library, and making purchases of novels on their e-readers in the comfort of their own home. With these e-readers you can simply purchase any book you would like, some books being under a buck or even free, saving you a trip to the bookstore. E-readers

Thesis: Students should be knowledgeable about the problem of textbooks being too expensive to purchase, therefore they should take a stand and enforce a new plan to reduce the cost of textbooks for college courses.

The alluring idea of being able to access so many books at the click of a button is enough to drive any book-worm crazy. The next step is to choose which God-given device to pick. The futuristic and tempting slogan on the Kindle website reads, “It’s not screen time - it’s book time.” On the Nook

Imagine a day when youngsters would leave for school carrying nothing more than an electronic device weighing less than one pound. The advent and growing popularity of electronic textbooks may make this a reality sooner rather than later. No more students trudging around with 20 pound backpacks strapped to their backs. No more lockers jammed with textbooks and notebooks. The benefits of transitioning to e-textbooks are many and provide advantages for both students and educators.

Marc Presnky argues that college should ban the use of physical books to encourage the use of electronic books. He gives three reasons to support his argument. The author of the article “College Should Mandate That All Textbooks Be Digitized” states three main advantages of having a bookless higher education. He believes that society should move beyond “physical books of the past” in order to move “education into the future” (Presnky). By employing the use of digitized books, Presnky believes that people will have features not quickly available to physical books such as comments or analysis about a book. Lastly, Presnky believes the biggest advantage of fully transitioning to e-books is the liberation of ideas from printed pages. He thinks

After analyzing both positions presented in the speech and the memorandum, it is clear that the speech by Keanu Williams is best supported because etextbooks are more expensive and technology does not cut down on learning time. Even though students are raised on technology, paper textbooks are better, and most children spend too much time on electronics and need a break from them.

As a new revolution rears its head due to rapidly evolving technology, many are becoming concerned with the potential problems that e-books could present. Ms. Elliot, a retired librarian, expresses her apprehension and concern for this electronic book form through a speech conducted at the “Reading: the future” forum. Directing her speech to mainly booklovers, she also reaches out to parents whose children will be most affected by the development of e-books.

Ethan Senack, a higher education associate at U.S. PIRG (Public Interest Research Group), wrote in his article titled, “Fixing The Broken Textbook Market: How Students Respond To High Textbook Cost And Demand Alternatives.” Whereas, he suggest that the problems associated with high pricing on textbooks, has nothing to do with the student. However, he feels that the students would be the most effective in seeking lower prices for textbooks. He gave several examples of colleges that are overcoming this barrier. One successful example he used was Maryland Open-Source Textbook (MOST). The university staff, professors and students worked together to generate ideas to reduce the cost of textbooks, using the use of open textbooks (16).

According to Mike Reese in his article "College Textbooks Regression Model", the average high school level textbook contains 542 pages. The average high school contains 700 students. Each student possesses an average of three books. There are 37100 schools in America. 8300 pages can be made from a single tree. So if we crunch the numbers, we end up with a staggering five million trees saved without textbooks. Not to mention, ink and covers. The environmental effects of this switch would provide lots of help to our earth. Not only would switching to online textbooks be less expensive for our environment, but for our students. The average college textbook costs between one and two hundred dollars. By eliminating the textbook market, we will loosen the firm grip of college fees. Almost 70% of students face debt after college, and by removing textbook payments, that number will drop, making many Americans happier. Information should not have a price. Free information via online copies would provide knowledge to many people who wouldn't otherwise have a copy. The internet sprung up in 1969 and has since been growing at an exponential rate. Like I previously stated, information and knowledge

Students can save a whole lot of time by not waiting in bookstore lines, and save a lot of money by using digital textbooks, often called e-books. The State Law requires digital college textbooks by 2020, according to Jean Cowden Moore, ( Ventura County Star ) 11 Jan. 2010. The state law, Senate Bill 48, says any individual or company selling textbooks to the University of California, California State University or private colleges must make them available electronically by 2020, “ to the extent practicable.” Sen. Elaine Alquist, D-San Jose, authored the law, saying digital textbooks are the future of the market and can significantly reduce costs for students.

In the article, “Textbooks Enter the Digital Era” A university student Jason Turgeon, realized there had to be a cheaper way to acquire textbooks. So in 2005 he started textbookrevolution.org., which links students with free digital textbooks on the Web. Turgeon then explains what the textbooks of the future may look

I do not know why, but I found myself not interested in books. In general, I think in out culture, reading is not popular as other cultures, and those who love reading is just an exception where the majority do not read. In addition, however, there is a generational shift towards reading habit, I think me and my generation do not read books as those in the previous two or three decades, and that’s due to many factors. Technology is one of the most important factors, one the other hand, Kindle is exploiting technology to make people love reading and it succeeded in doing so with me and others. Unsurprisingly, a study shows that those of age between 19 to 29 are the most prolific E-book readers (1). However,this artifact (E-book) is posing any considerable threat to the hardcopy book industry in the near future. There’s a report shows that a few readers have abandoned the hardcopy books for E-books

Even though it is true that reading on real papers will help the readers pay attention to the contents than the screen and they can “practice an unnatural process of thought” (219), the writer overlooks advantages of e-books and other online information. Reading on pages is utterly better than reading on the screen, but carrying printed books is more inconvenient than carrying a laptop which can access numerous e-books. In addition, not everyone can afford printed books. For those people who need a lot of books, especially students, e-books and other online sources are rather economical and reasonable choices. And another great thing of it, on the internet, information is updated continuously, whereas printed books might be out of date and the readers have to buy new editions. Moreover, internet is a chance for people over the world to reach the book they need, because there is not every book are translated into other languages, or the original ones are not be transferred to their countries. With these benefit, printed books has become difficult to overwhelm the

The essay “What are the Enablers and Barriers to Successful Adoption and Commercialization of Digital Textbooks,” discusses the many benefits and drawback of transitioning to digital textbooks. The essay asserts that digital textbooks are on the rise and that there is a good probability they will overtake printed textbooks

During the development of technology, most people have shifted to use electronic books to read both academic and non-academic texts. However, despite the technological changes, there has been a wide debate about the benefits of paper books over the e-books. It is important to understand that various reasons are suggesting why people should shift back to using the traditional books rather than the electronic ones. Even though some think that e-books are better that traditional ones, I believe that readers should return to traditional books because of various reasons.