As an adjunct professor with no benefits, zero job security, ridiculously low pay, and a level of vocational respect equivalent to that accorded toilet-bowl cleaners, I know that my heart ought to go out to the publishing industry, another great loser. As most of us are aware, publishers are besieged—by the ruthless conglomerates that now own them and that find their low profit margins nearly intolerable, by digital technology and digital competition that is assassinating their business models, and by a dumbed-down readership that is abandoning print faster than you can say “Snooki.”

All that is very sad, but college-textbook publishers deserve whatever terrible misfortunes may befall them. As my only means of voting against these behemoths, I intend to dump all textbook publishers from my syllabi—including the company whose textbooks I have utilized for eight years in my…

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