• Life Advice & Visual Arts Welcome Guest
    Posting Rules Bluelight Rules
    🌌 Share Your Dreams! 🌌
    📸 15 Years of Photo Contests 📸
  • LAVA Moderator: Mysterier

Stupid Textbooks

S

shypht

Bluelighter
Joined
Jan 10, 2006
Messages
355
Grrrr, I hate textbooks and their bloody 'editions'.

A year or two ago, I had a Macroeconomics course, got the textbook for it - but before the class started, I dropped it to swap it for another class and figured "Well, this is a mandatory course anyways, so I'll just hold onto the textbook till next term" - I get around to taking it again, and they have moved to a new edition. My bookstore as a "no refunds after 8 weeks" policy - so I cant get a refund on this book, or exchange it for the new edition even though this book is still in its packaging.

And, I also traded 3 of my old textbooks to a friend of mine in exchange for 2 textbooks of his - both of which are now out of edition, and even after talking with the proff to see "Hey, is it OK if I use an out of edition book?" (Some say its fine and not to worry) -- they both said no, there are big enough changes in the format/layout/content of the book that it would be too hard to keep things in synch.

So, I went from thinking I only had to buy 2 books this semester (which already cost me $170), to now needing to buy 3 others! dammnit. And the one book I've already paid for -- now I need to buy it AGAIN just because the fucken editions changed.
 
ask your professor if the old edition would suffice. Frequently the new edition is not much different from the previous one.
 
You can always try to sell the ones that you have, and try to pick up any of the new editions on the cheap... We have a SRC (Student representative counsel) bookshop here at Sydney Uni where you can buy/sell most textbooks.

Other than that, generally you can get by with the old edition, it may just be a bit more of a hassle for you to MAKE SURE that you are reading the right section/doing any exercises/problems/examples at the right time. Usually there isn't all that much that has changed, and the profs are too lazy/busy to give the right information for multiple editions. So basically you can probably live with what you have, but you have to make the extra effort to make sure you are in the right place at the right time.

Good luck!

CB :)
 
plus most college classes don't end up being as hard as you think they'll be. So even though a teacher will tell you it will be difficult for you w/ an older edition, it really will not be.
 
You can download alot of books free from torrents these days, you'd be suprised at how many textbooks there are available online.
 
I had a couple out-of-date textbooks last semester and it didn't seem to make a difference. When I tried to return some of the up-to-date books at the end, they were already using a new edition.

Thankfully this semester I did not spend quite as much on books.
 
getyourselfhigh200 said:
You can download alot of books free from torrents these days, you'd be suprised at how many textbooks there are available online.
Click to expand...

um links?
 
^^ Google the name of the text along with 'torrent', or just go to any bit torrent site and do a search.

I'm so glad I'm studying literature - even though we have to buy a lot of course texts compared to people studying other subjects, classic books are dirt cheap in bookstores compared to other books so it doesn't work out as that much anyway. Although I expect there'll be more theory books in the coming years.
 
i never buy textbooks.

use "ext:torrent" though if you're googling. . not just the word torrent
 
i bought 700 dollars worth of books this semester to get arrested and drop out a week later... i cant believe i spent more on books than i did on tuition
 
GO TO AMAZON! I swear you can save sooooooooo much money on books by going to amazon.com. I have saved hundreds of $ on textbooks by that site. I had one book one semester 100bucks... found it on amazon for 20 :)
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Top