Re: [seul-edu] open textbooks

[Ray Olszewski <ray@comarre.com>]

At 10:03 AM 10/17/00 -0400, Doug Loss wrote:
...
>As you say, however, the problem will be getting people to create and maintain
>the texts.  What's the incentive for regular textbook writers?  I doubt it's
>profit-oriented, as I can't conceive of a best-selling 2nd year world history
>text.  Still, people write them.  

Are you kidding, Doug? A successful textbook is ENORMOUSLY profitable; I
know a few people who have made what we would all call fortunes by writing
texts that were widely adopted. 

My personal knowledge is of people writing college texts, plus one who did
primary-grade math materials. But publishers spend enough to get textbook
adoptions, especially in states that adopt at the state level (e.g.,
California, Texas) that the profitability must be enormous ... either for
the author as royalties or for the publisher who pays the author a fixed fee.

If a given text is used by (say) 10% of 11th-grade students, that's probably
a half million copies ... is that enough to make a "best seller" or not?

There may be other reasons why people write high-school texts, but don't
dismiss money (and the *chance* for really big money) as one of them.


--
------------------------------------"Never tell me the odds!"---
Ray Olszewski                                        -- Han Solo
Palo Alto, CA           	 	         ray@comarre.com        
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