It's the season.

That is the checkout price for all my books for this fall semester from the Boise State University bookstore. This includes a $200 paper back and most likely hand bound in the bookstore copy of a Mastering Chemistry written by none other than my Chemistry professor. It's not uncommon to have books written by the teacher themselves. They make serious bank on them. I don't really blame them for it, but for $196.75 for a book (optional by the way) I don't even need is Bull-Shit. I know for a fact the day I show up to Chemistry on the 23rd, the teacher is going to be pushing the students to buy her book. By the next time class meets, I'll probably see a third of them clutching her book. That means the bookstore will bring in around $13,000 from my class buying an OPTIONAL book alone, this teacher has 3 sections of the same class. It wouldn't surprise me to find out that within the first week of classes more than a half a million dollars changes hands in the bookstore. Oh, and one thing I have learned about books from BSU's own professors and teachers custom books, they don't buy them back.

This place is a lifesaver, I remember the day my dad helped me move in just before my Freshman year, after I was all unloaded I went to the bookstore with my Dad, printed off my booksheet and went wild. With help from an employee I had my 60lb stack of books in no time. All together they cost about $450, and if there was a used version in stock I had it. I had a meager $1500 saved up for the upcoming year, but I was ready to plunk my card down to buy those books, as each book was rang up I thought about all the work I had done over the summer and during my senior year, a third of it flashed before my eyes. I knew that in the winter I would be repeating the process for another semester. Thankfully, my Dad was kind enough to pay for them even after everything he had done to help so far. Shortly before Christmas break I was referred to Half.com to buy my books. So, before I even took my finals for the Fall I had every single book I needed for the Spring semester. If I would have gone to the bookstore Springs books would have cost around $500, I was able to get every last required book for...wait for it...$100. Since then, I have not bought a book from the bookstore unless it was a last resort. In fact one semester, I was able to turn a small profit selling my books from Half.com to the bookstore.

About an hour ago, I bought 3 of the 6 required books for this upcoming semester on Half.com, normally from the bookstore, they would have cost $260, I got them all for $115 including shipping. I still need to buy 3 required Chemistry books that are about $55 each, and it seems they are all brand new or a Boise State exclusive printing, so little chance of finding it in Half.com. (Though I did buy my Pre-Calc Boise State Exclusive Print on Half.com from someone out of Boise).

What drives me really off the wall about many of the books I buy new from the bookstore, is they were brand new, so I couldn't find them online. Then once the semester is over, they wont buy it back because a new edition has come out. Now, I don't speak for every new edition out there, but from my observations, these upgrades that for some reason deem a new edition, are merely typo fixes, slight corrections and sometimes they just shuffled the chapters around (I'm looking at you Sociology) and print a new edition. many of these revisions could just be printed on a single piece of paper then sold for $2, but no.

So, without further ado, I bring you my solution to the rising costs of books.

 
(The Amazon Kindle E-Book Reader)No longer will small revisions to books require a new $70 book, no longer will bookstores need to have massive stock shipped to and from warehouses at the end and beginning of each term. No longer will I be carrying a massive pile of books to class each morning, no longer will I have to worry about books getting stolen (I am victim of this selfish crime). Amazon would make a killing and could work a deal with Universitys and Colleges, even High Schools world wide to sell them at discounted rates to students. Textbooks can now be sold digitally for significantly lower prices, the kindle allows for digital note taking and highlighting, wireless Wikipedia access via the Sprint 3g (rolling out 4g in Boise as I type) network.

I pray to every god ever conceived that this was a reality.