It's been a while since Copyfight paid much attention to the highly IP-restrictive market in college textbooks, particularly since I stopped teaching a few years ago. Efforts like Ed Felten's seem to have petered out. So I was very pleased to read Andrea James' piece in boingboing yesterday taking on the textbook cartels directly.

James goes through the similarities between textbook publishing and the (legal prescription) drug market in point-by-point detail, with citations and sources. Well worth reading both the summary points and following up the extensive URL links. James also replies to several of the reader comments in response to the posting.