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Professor Creates His Own Cisco Manual
yootje writes "ZDnet is running a story about a professor who made his own Cisco networking textbook, with 800 pages: "Computing instructor Matt Basham's suggestions for improving Cisco Systems' official training manuals fell on deaf ears for years. But he appears to have the networking giant's attention now." The professor made his book available for free on his website."
I'm still wondering why the governments don't require free and "open source" text for public schools. In college, the professors used to change the text every semester so that the students couldn't sell the books back at the end of the semester (likely getting kick-backs from the text manufacturers, no doubt).
If just one state would sit down and even purchase some good works and make them freely available for modification and distribution, then the cost of education would be greatly reduced. Profs would be free to make changes at it fits their style so long as those changes are re-posted to the public. Students could read the texts online and/or print them.
What am I not seeing here?
Life is the leading cause of death in America.
Thanks guys...I am not a lawyer but have spent several years studying copyright and internet law...I even got the opportunity to lead a session at Harvard Law School one summer. Heck, one of the professors there, Johnathon Zittrain, even downloaded the book...he's an old-school chat room moderator turned internet lawyer...he and his colleagues have even taking pro-bono work to fight for open source rights. I think I have sufficiently covered my assets with respect to the book...it has actually been out for three years and I haven't heard anything so far. Besides I put some really specific phrases in there that help cast aside their chances. Thanks again. I will go out and read all the posts too. You should see the one on www.macpro.se that appeared in swedish! Gratis lärobok för Ciscos kurser Thanks again Matt PS if you download the book shoot me an email and let me know where you are located...I am keeping track on a map. Bashamm@spcollege.edu