RE: US consumer purchase of international editions

["John Cox" <John.E.Cox@btinternet.com>]

Jean-Claude Guedon assumes that the motive for market
segmentation is simply the greed of multi-national capitalists
(on whose taxes higher education in Canada and elsewhere is
hugely dependent).  But there is another explanation, which is
based on my own experience as a publisher of over 40 years'
experience.

Most textbooks have traditionally been developed for and
published in the developed world.  Their prices were usually set
in direct relationship to the total cost of publication and
distribution, including royalties payable to the author(s) and
the publisher's overheads.  It was found in the 1950s and 1960s
that students in less developed countries were unable to afford
these prices.  So publishers either licensed the publication
rights to a local publisher that could sell into its local
territory at a locally acceptable price, or republished the
textbook as a low cost edition for less well-endowed markets,
having recovered much of the cost of publication on the original
edition.  These were often referred to as "International Student
Editions" or something similar.  Their sale was limited to
specified countries - that was the point, because their price was
related to the marginal cost of republication, rather than the
full cost of original publication.  Many of the publishers that I
knew - and know - have done this out of wholly altruistic
reasons.

It has always been important for restrict the sale of such
international student editions to the countries for which they
were intended.  To allow importation back into the developed
world would undermine the economics of textbook publishing as we
know it.

John Cox

Managing Director
John Cox Associates Ltd
Rookwood
Bradden
TOWCESTER
Northants
NN12 8ED
United Kingdom
E-mail: John.E.Cox@btinternet.com
Web: www.johncoxassociates.co.uk

-----Original Message-----
From: owner-liblicense-l@lists.yale.edu
[mailto:owner-liblicense-l@lists.yale.edu] 
On Behalf Of Jean-Claude Guedon Sent: 25 September 2009 01:19
To: liblicense-l@lists.yale.edu
Subject: Re: US consumer purchase of international editions

Market segmentation by region of the world has nothing to do with
copyright. it has all to do with extracting maximum profit from
each market by playing on the total "price x #sales". It is the
same strategy with the zones for DVD's and just as reprehensible.
it also works for drugs, and there is is downright abominable
(remember US elders coming to Canada to buy drugs at about half
the price of US prices a few years back)..

Nothing in copyright law says anything about marketing
strategies. It speaks to modalities of property when applied to
documents (in the widest sense) of all kinds, and only to that.

Moreover, and so far as I know, no country has any law capable of
stopping a book from being introduced in a country even if the
cover says "not for resale in x, y and z. I am not talking about
books banned for whatever reasons here. Division of world markets
between various distributors is based on contracts. It is
implemented through contract laws, not copyright. In any case, at
the individual level, the first sale doctrine allows me to resell
a book from somewhere to be sold again in the US or elsewhere.

What I would hope for is that students should quickly organize
(within the limits of the law) ways to bring in these cheaper
volumes in their country and thus save a lot of money to their
colleagues, perhaps make a little bit of money themselves, and
expose one of the most despicable strategies of multinationals.
Or better still, students should get involved in the OER movement
(open educational resources).

Jean-Claude Guedon