You have absolutely no reason to believe that anyone needed or wanted those books. I have already pointed out that I renewed all of them twice before the fines began to apply. If no one had placed them on reserve nine weeks into the quarter (my college used the quarter system rather than the semester) it is reasonable to assume that no one had any great need for the books. And even if they did, why does their need take precedence over mine? There was nothing illegal or immoral in what I did.
It would be tough luck. I didn’t break any rules, and you still haven’t explained why their need was more important than mine.
To the OP, Are you kidding? Most professors I’ve had tell the class to get the required text by hook or by crook and often give tips on where to get it cheaper. (though in my experience, at my university, the official bookstore is often the best deal…despite what some spout off, they usually have used copies for the same or less than other sources. SO NOT some “capitalist conspiracy” as I felt compelled to share with a class recently when someone put forth that theory; “Bullshit. I paid $26 for the text at the campus store…where do you come up with your crazy figure of $150?”:dubious:
Anyway, NO, it is not considered rude or in any other way in poor taste. Most of us students are poor and most profs realize that. They can’t LEGALLY tell you to go download it for free, but many hint at it.
I’ve had more than one professor put library copies of the text into the two-hour reserves so that more than one student could make it through class without buying the book. I think it happened less than ten times while I was there, though.
Freud, I’m guessing that **Polecat’s **library only allowed a certain number of renewals before requiring that the book be checked back in and reshelved, whether anyone needed it or not. It’s an older style of book management.
Tell me something, do you have any concept of a non-financial relationship?
The fines in Uni library’s aren’t high because sometimes students have accidents or are faced with unavoidable issues, therefore its kind to not make them suffer too much for what may not be their fault. This does not mean that because its cheap its a license to hog the books.
A good way to tell if your behaviour is ethical is to imagine what would happen if everyone acted the way you did. What do you think would happen?
I’d also like to know how you’d deal with this situation. When I went to University in Copenhagen they frequently didn’t charge for any fines or even sometimes for lost books, does this mean it would be ethical for me to have gone and taken as many course books as I could and just hang onto them?
I don’t think many colleges make any money, if at all, on the on-campus bookstores, except perhaps the rental fee for occupying campus space. I don’t think they make money on the sell of the stuff there, and if they do, I don’t think it is their major source of revenue. So get the book anywhere you need.
Personally, as a graduate student, I dislike “reserve” books, and I dislike students like Lonesome. Do you know what it is, needing a basic textbook, and finding out it’s unavailable for my perusal? That they won’t even let me take it out for a couple of hours while I skim and photocopy the pages I want? Because the only recent and up to date textbooks are on damn reserve, a reserve so strict, they won’t let even needy graduate students check them out (for the couple of hours it’d take to photocopy the needed sources)?
I’m not sure I really see what the big deal is with LonesomePolecat. There is a pool [p] of persons eligible for using a library book. Each and every member [m(1)…m(n)] of p is identical for the purpose of loaning books, i.e., ,m(1) = m(2) = m(3) … = m(n). They’re all indistinguishable.
Speaking as a librarian, that’s not why fines are “cheap” at all. Setting fines is a delicate balancing act between making them high enough to be a deterrent, but low enough that people will pay them and not feel ripped off. Because someone who feels ripped off will just blow off their fines.
So the current sweet spot for fines has been found to be about 25 cents a day with a cap after $5-10 has been racked up. This cap (along with only a handful of renewals) will likely cover the entire semester. Lonesome didn’t really do anything wrong.
Okay, one more time: Why does your need take precedence over mine? Especially since I have no reason to think that you or anybody else needs the book?
We both need a book from the library. I get to it before you do and check it out. I renew it twice, and in the nine weeks I have the book you never place it on reserve or indicate to the library in any way that you want it. Having used up my renewals, I find I still need the book, and decide to pay the fine.
As I need the book, and I have no reason to think that somebody else needs it (the fact that nobody has placed it on reserve in nine weeks indicates that there’s no demand for it) I see no ethical problem with my decision.
I just got done purchasing my daughter’s first semester books: $610. I bought every one that I could buy as used.
I looked up their ISBN numbers on Amazon.com and was surprised that only one was significantly cheaper (about $25) than the bookstore. But then I would have had to ship it expedited, so I went ahead and bought them all via the bookstore.
The problem is not the bookstore’s markup but the cost of the textbook itself. One book alone was over $100. Give me a freaking break.
On their website, the university touted two alternate formats for textbooks: 1) Ebooks, which could be downloaded to their computer for a certain amount of time and cost ~40% of the cost of the textbook; and 2) book rental, where she could return it in good shape by a certain date and qualify for 50-70% back). However, none of my daughter’s first year textbooks were available in the alternate formats.
I think as universities feel the pressure of the economy, textbook prices will have to come down. $1200 a year for books is ridiculously high.
I think Lonesome Polecat should use his story of “cost savings” in future interviews so that prospective employers could be impressed by his sense of ingenuity.
That sounds reasonable on the surface. What you’re not understanding is that the fines are more of a social signal then an economic one, one that most people intrinsically understand but you seem to have missed. The whole principle behind library’s is that they share a scarce resource, by only attributing only your needs with any value you undermine the whole system.
I ask again what would happen if everyone acted the way you did? I can think of a number of possibilities, most of them detrimental to the students that need the books - including you.
Saying “why do your needs take preference over mine” isn’t enough. If the resource is used wisely - as a library attempts to do, then everybody can use the text book . Your way only you can.
As of this year, there’s a new federal law (the Higher Education Opportunity Act) that requires colleges and universities receiving federal financial aid (i.e., virtually all of them) to provide information (warning: PDF) to help students shop around for textbooks. So not only isn’t it impolite to shop around, doing so is aided by the feds. Meanwhile, Scott McNealy and Vinod Khosla have started projects to develop “open-source” textbooks (although these are mostly secondary school textbooks). One company charges $30 for a monochrome printing of a textbook or $60 for a color one, versus maybe $200 for a conventional book.
I’m not going to judge the ethics of your particular situation. I’ll just point out that a fine is not the same as a fee. A fine is intended to discourage you from doing something—it’s not just the cost of doing that thing. (For example, if you have to pay a parking fine, it’s because you parked where you weren’t supposed to, or for longer than you were supposed to. Even if you paid the fine, you still did something wrong—you caused potential harm by parking there. But on the other hand there are places where you are allowed/supposed to park, you just have to pay for the privilege.)
A huge number of library users do act the way Lonesome does. Thankfully, most items are much more plentiful than your average college textbook so there’s usually at least one copy of something circulating.
Honestly, while Lonesome should think of other people when he wants to borrow an item, two renewals and a nine-week borrowing period is the norm. It’s expected. That’s why the library has a reserve system, but if nobody uses it, they shouldn’t be shocked the item they want isn’t available when they want it.
There are a lot of things I could do that would not be against any rules, but hurt you. Let’s see–you have your email in your profile. That means I could spam your email box forever and make it totally useless. According to your logic, that would be completely moral. Heck, I’m very tempted, because apparently you missed the lesson that hurting other people for your own gain is wrong, and I would merely be inflicting social punishment. But I’m not that type of guy.
Look, if you actually pay attention to what people label as evil, you’ll find that there’s a common theme–valuing your own happiness at the expense of others. That’s what you did here. Your defense is entirely that it helped you, and anyone else could have done it. (Again, anyone can do a lot of immoral things.) To be a moral act, you would need to explain how it helped others. Instead, you can’t even explain how it didn’t hurt.
As for why others have more rights than you? BECAUSE THERE ARE MORE OF US, and thus each of our hurts add up to being more of yours. It’s not complicated–it’s something most people learn in kindergarten. If you are selfish and don’t share, you get shunned.
Finally, I’ll point out that morality is a social construct, and the best response you’ve gotten is that what you did wasn’t so bad. That should tell you something.
