"Security Engineering" Is Now Online 103
An anonymous reader writes "Ross Anderson, author of 'Security Engineering', notifies in a message to comp.risks that he just got permission from Wiley to let anyone download the full content of his book for free. This is one of the best books on computer security and it is used as textbook in many University courses (I teach two of them)."
Backwards System (Score:5, Interesting)
If we were concerned about artists, you'd put all their music online--eliminating album profits to them and labels--and pay to see the live shows. That's where they make all their money anyway.
Poor tech authors often sign anything that's in front of them to get their books out. Which means they don't make squat on the sales plus the publisher hikes the price up so that they turn a good profit. Ever bought Duda, Hart & Stork's Pattern Classification [amazon.com]? Good luck, $100 for a six year old book!? Give me the black and white Asian release that's illegally sold on eBay for $10. Yet it remains a standard in the field.
You don't believe me that authors sign outrageous contracts? Well, this poor man had to beg to get his work online. Sounds like he didn't sign a contract that left him creative and absolute control over the distribution of this work.
Yet if they don't get it into print, it can't be used in a classroom setting. What a terrible system (hail capitalism). To all artists, authors and producers of media, please cut out the middle men that make it nearly impossible for me to afford your beautiful works and more or less cheat you out of money in a highway robbery-like scam.
Printed word was an amazing invention because it posed a method to mechanically copy texts and ideas and get them out to people. The internet allows you to do that for nearly free
Re:Backwards System (Score:5, Interesting)
Fortunately, this isn't always true! While taking my advanced operating systems course, we used Linux Device Drivers which is available online for free [xml.com]. This is also the case with my Programming Languages class where we learned and wrote an interpreter for Scheme. Then, in my computers and society class we used [scheme.com]ESR's writings [catb.org] and Stallman's biography [oreilly.com].
Maybe more topics could be covered in free format... Seems to me like Google is making life easier for some English courses [google.com] and MIT already has opencourseware up and running [mit.edu].
Guess I went off on a tangent over one little line...
Re:Backwards System (Score:5, Interesting)
What an imbecilic troll. The problem isn't capitalism, it's the inherent nature of a bureaucratic system -- it's resistant to change (for good reason -- there are lots of crappy ideas out there). This depends not at all on what kind of socioeconomic system is in place, and capitalism may indeed offer better opportunities for authors (do you think an autocratic economic system would enhance the ability of authors to get their material accepted in the classroom?).
Please note, I am not a free market idealist. I am also not an apologist for the publishing industry, and their treatment of authors. However, you severely misrepresent the fact that publishers such as Wiley do indeed provide services to authors, and to the public. (Editing, fact-checking, vetting, advertising, marketing, etc).
Disclaimer: I work in magazine publishing, which is an entirely different kettle of fish. I do, however, deal with book authors on a frequent basis, both self-published and thos epublished by major imprints.
Two questions (Score:3, Interesting)
2) Does anyone have a link, or simple way, to download this entire book in one file or torrent?
Yes, it would. (Score:3, Interesting)
Yes, it would. Strangely enough, books were written before "publishers" were invented.
Contracts do not always "serve" both party's interests. As in the case of the author's previous work no longer being published. How does that server the author's interests?
Maybe you aren't familiar with the term "middleman"?
The "middleman" is between (in the "middle") the producer and the consumer. The author is the producer, I am the consumer. So my interests are a factor.
And it is "business decisions" such as that that are driving the changes in the market.
Which is why so many of the "middlemen" are fighting to keep extending the copyright period. They want to re-write the laws to artificially create barriers between the producer and the consumer.