Responding to complaints by parents the Turkish government has pulled all used books from their Free Class Books Project.
From Education Minister Nimet Çubukçu:
The course books distributed within the scope of the Free Class Books Project cannot be used, as the schools lack the infrastructure to control and protect the books. As the parents do not find the used books hygienic, giving a group of students new books and others used books does not serve our educational needs
This is one wacky story and I have to wonder if something got lost in the translation. If indeed used books are unsanitary and need to be controlled and protected where does that leave the public library? I can also see the light bulbs going on at Amazon - we can solve this problem by giving them all Kindles!
Stories like this reiterate the challenge that still exists, here in this country and apparently around the world, in making non-new books a legitimate option. For whatever reason, for many, used is still not an option when considering a book purchase. This dilemma has improved somewhat since the advent of the online book marketplaces but by no means has "used" attained equal footing with new. Perhaps if we called them recycled books...
Story at Hurriyet Daily News and Economic Review
2 comments:
My sister won't read either used books or library books for this very reason. But she somehow forgets that most new books are handled by *someone* before they reach her.
I personally don't get it. I like used books, especially when the previous owner has left something interesting inside, like a note or a photo.
While researching Edward Stratemeyer I came upon the text of a marketing campaign which began "don't let your kids read borrowed books" because a used book might have been in a sick room and could transmit disease. The notion was that each reader should own their own new copies of the books they liked. In this period (1916) it was common for a given book to be read by 3-6 kids as they were traded around. Hence, if a book's sales were 10,000 copies, the reach for the book might be 50,000 readers.
Of course we have our own similar insanity today with the CPSC ruling on whether used books from before 1985 can be placed in the hands of children below age 10 or so for possible exposure to lead. No word on whether the kids should be told not to eat their books. There were stories of thrift stores clearing out the shelves of all children's books to ensure that they could comply with this bizarre ruling and who knows how many collectibles were lost due to this unintended consequence. A big part of the problem was the expensive and destructive testing plus the fact that the reseller was being held responsible for both the testing any any possible negative consequences for selling the items. Some people flipped on the side of blind paranoia and planned to get out of children's books entirely.
James
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