I have also raised the same issue with the editors some time ago, and I do understand their arguments. But those arguments aside, the fact remains that the price of the book is prohibitive and only feeds into a system of privileged access to information/ knowledge. While living and studying in Canada has its advantages in terms of access to academic scholarship, what about all of the universities in the rest of the world whose ability to purchase access to digital databases is limited? I can't tell you how often I am asked to search and download academic articles for my colleagues working in other parts of the world, and then send them by email. But even if we put the issue of digital divides aside, there are also professional reasons for owning your own copy of a reference book or a handbook. Maybe the next generation of scholars, more used to reading on the computer screens or on other types of devices, won't face the same problem; but when it comes to critical thinking, I still find it extremely difficult to engage with a digital copy. Just to give a trivial example, my university's library kicks you out after 5 to 10 minutes of reading a digital book. Delia Dumitrica PhD Student & Sessional Instructor Department of Communication and Culture University of Calgary
------------------------------
Message: 13 Date: Wed, 9 Mar 2011 10:40:24 -0600 From: Steve Jones <sjones@uic.edu> To: Michael Gurstein <gurstein@gmail.com> Cc: 'Air list' <air-l@listserv.aoir.org> Subject: Re: [Air-L] book announcement Message-ID: <05AAFDD2-0B87-4B45-A625-9C63B4B91DE8@uic.edu> Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii
Some - not all - publishers do provide, among other things, copyediting, layout and design, marketing, publicity, and in some cases (particularly journals, but sometimes also handbooks and reference books) funds that allow us to support students.
It would be interesting to know whether academic libraries are keen on purchasing e-books. Does anyone have any insight or data? They're certainly comfortable purchasing licenses to electronic versions of journals, but how about books?
Thanks,
Steve