I suppose people in the publishing industry will want the text book firms to win this one, but the people want Barabas.
Print publishing is dead, and partly the reason for the justification of the exorbitant prices. Before online access, publishers ran small low volume print runs to get the updated text books out year after year. The smaller the run, the more the actual price per book. Some books probably cost $40 per unit if the runs are small enough.
Now, I see no reason the content should not be included with the course in electronic format. There really isnt any new content to publish for most subjects. Just updates as new material is found, say in physics, and medicine.
Its a scam, they know it, and the whole education content creation industry needs to change.