I was in a class where the required book was written by the professor. However, fortunately, the book was really fantastic and better than any other book I have seen. Plus it was like $15.

I think he wrote the book so that students didn't have to spend money on a huge textbook containing information they don't need. This book had everything you needed for the class and not much more.

I had a teacher that did the same thing...almost, he sold us the book after he had taught the class :P

Had a class with a book written by the professor... only available at 60€ at a local shop.

>The savviest rotate the problems from semester to semester to ensure zero resale value.

Not trying to tell you that there aren't some jackasses who do this for extra loot, but one good reason to rotate the problems is to prevent students from showing up with an answer key. ie: When I was in college our IEEE club had a more comprehensive question bank than any single prof at my uni.

Any college worth attending doesn't make homework a condition of your grades. If your class can be beaten by an "answer key" you aren't teaching/testing anything important.

On the flip side, I had a professor who intentionally assigned older versions of textbooks since they were more affordable and the material had not really changed between editions.

Another economics professor produced her own reader/workbook which was provided for the cost of photocopying and binding.

The professors friendliest to student budgets even separated their custom materials into "lecture notes" which contained only instructional material and "exercises" which were generally made up of problems that actually appeared on previous exams, including space to write in. Total cost for this style of "textbook" per course was less than $20, purchased new from the university bookstore. Or you could inherit an older copy of the notes for free and just get a new copy of the exercise portion.

That kind of thing would be a free download today. Can you imagine paying thousands of dollars in tuition for a course, and then getting the entire textbook for free?

Those who do it are truly saints among scoundrels.

My Economics professor famously used to release a new version of his textbook every year at my school. I suppose recognizing the forces at hand, he was making the most rational decision in doing so.

My Biology professor wrote the textbook he used in his class. And on the first day of class he gave each student who had purchased a new copy a cash refund on his author's royalty.

That must've amounted to several tens of cents (per book) on the $200 price tag.

Mine did that as well. He also offered unlimited extra credit at the rate of 5pts per error found.

A small group of us got together that first evening and found enough typos, spelling and punctuation errors that we all passed the class with a high "A" without needing to do anything else.

He wasn't happy about it, and I think he later dropped the "unlimited" part. He was less upset when most of us went to class anyway -- The way I saw it, I paid for the class, even if I didn't have to worry about doing the work for a grade, I still wanted to learn something.

And did he give you a speech about how he was doing you a favor because eliminating the resale market lowered the original price? Mine did.

I'm not sure if my professor was being nice or not as savvy as you describe because the course was taught with a printed out book by him and another professor but all he charged for the entire book (plus homework problems) was 40 bucks USD. This was back in 2006 so I don't know what he's charging now (assuming he's not retired by now). By comparison, the average new book at the university book store was around 80 USD (at the lowest).