Submitted by Anonymous (not verified) on December 13, 2007 - 14:06.
As a former textbook editor (really more writer) for a Texas-based published that has long since been gobbled up--multiple times--by bigger publishers, I can vouch for the accuracy of Ansary's comments.
One factor he failed to mention that I saw at work at the company where I worked was the disastrous effect the ascendancy of the bean-counters in the late 1970s and early 1980s had on textbook quality. Everything began to revolve around products that had to be conceived, planned, written and published within the calendar year. Long-range planning went out the window; finding competent authors went out the window; and the whole business frankly went to hell in a handbasket.
So I went free-lance and wrote for the developers and the few publishers who (then) still things themselves.
No more. I have an honest job now.
Textbook editing
Submitted by Anonymous (not verified) on December 13, 2007 - 14:06.
As a former textbook editor (really more writer) for a Texas-based published that has long since been gobbled up--multiple times--by bigger publishers, I can vouch for the accuracy of Ansary's comments.
One factor he failed to mention that I saw at work at the company where I worked was the disastrous effect the ascendancy of the bean-counters in the late 1970s and early 1980s had on textbook quality. Everything began to revolve around products that had to be conceived, planned, written and published within the calendar year. Long-range planning went out the window; finding competent authors went out the window; and the whole business frankly went to hell in a handbasket.
So I went free-lance and wrote for the developers and the few publishers who (then) still things themselves.
No more. I have an honest job now.