Reasonably priced C11 standard?

[Keith Thompson]

Years ago, I bought a PDF copy of the ISO C90 standard from ansi.org
for $18. I later bought a PDF copy of the C99 standard for either
$18 or $30

Now when I look on webstore.ansi.org, the C99 standard is still
available for $30, but they want $285 for ISO/IEC 9899:2011.

iso.org is charging CHF 238, which is about $255 US at current
exchange rates.

Apparently ANSI had a policy of selling the C99 standard at a
reasonable price. Why does that policy not apply to the C11
standard? Is any other organization selling (legal!) copies of
C11 at a lower price?

(The same thing seems to be happening with the ISO C++ standard.)

 

[Keith Thompson]

[snip]

Sorry, I meant to post that to comp.std.c. I'll repost there.

 

[jacob navia]

Le 25/01/12 21:53, Keith Thompson a écrit :

Apparently ANSI had a policy of selling the C99 standard at a
reasonable price. Why does that policy not apply to the C11
standard? Is any other organization selling (legal!) copies of
C11 at a lower price?

That would be risky. If the price was low, many people could read that
stuff.

 

[paolo]

Years ago, I bought a PDF copy of the ISO C90 standard from ansi.org for
$18. I later bought a PDF copy of the C99 standard for either $18 or
$30

Now when I look on webstore.ansi.org, the C99 standard is still
available for $30, but they want $285 for ISO/IEC 9899:2011.

iso.org is charging CHF 238, which is about $255 US at current exchange
rates.

Apparently ANSI had a policy of selling the C99 standard at a reasonable
price. Why does that policy not apply to the C11 standard? Is any
other organization selling (legal!) copies of C11 at a lower price?

(The same thing seems to be happening with the ISO C++ standard.)

Just be patient, it will be on the torrents in a couple of weeks.

 

[James Kuyper]

Just be patient, it will be on the torrents in a couple of weeks.

He did specify that he was looking for legal copies.

 

[Rich Webb]

Years ago, I bought a PDF copy of the ISO C90 standard from ansi.org
for $18. I later bought a PDF copy of the C99 standard for either
$18 or $30

Now when I look on webstore.ansi.org, the C99 standard is still
available for $30, but they want $285 for ISO/IEC 9899:2011.

iso.org is charging CHF 238, which is about $255 US at current
exchange rates.

Apparently ANSI had a policy of selling the C99 standard at a
reasonable price. Why does that policy not apply to the C11
standard? Is any other organization selling (legal!) copies of
C11 at a lower price?

(The same thing seems to be happening with the ISO C++ standard.)

The price seems to change based on an algorithm that accounts for the
flow in the Héraðsvötn, the price of beef in Cochabamba, and the annual
rainfall total in Darwin.

I picked up a PDF copy of C99 from INCITS http://www.incits.org/ a
couple of years ago for only $30 and now they want $220 and only the
printed version is available there while, as you note, ANSI still offers
a $30 PDF. Sheesh...

 

[jacob navia]

Le 02/02/12 22:27, Rich Webb a écrit :

I picked up a PDF copy of C99 from INCITS http://www.incits.org/ a
couple of years ago for only $30 and now they want $220 and only the
printed version is available there while, as you note, ANSI still offers
a $30 PDF. Sheesh...

Note that the The Art of Computer Programming, Volumes 1-4A Boxed Set
[Hardcover] costs only 200 US$. That puts that ridiculous price in
perspective.

 

[Fritz Wuehler]

He did specify that he was looking for legal copies.

Well that's a fine point. It will be a *copy* of a legal copy. Will that
work for you? Works for me! ;-)

 

[Walter Banks]

Well that's a fine point. It will be a *copy* of a legal copy. Will that
work for you? Works for me! ;-)

No it doesn't work for me .

 

[lawrence.jones]

Note that the The Art of Computer Programming, Volumes 1-4A Boxed Set
[Hardcover] costs only 200 US$. That puts that ridiculous price in
perspective.

Commercial books pricing has very little in common with standards
pricing. Standards are priced solely based on page count with no
consideration of potential sales. The average standard probably doesn't
sell more than a dozen copies. If TAOCP only sold a dozen copies, it
wouldn't be $200, either.

INCITS understands that the potential market for computer language
standards is much larger than that for other standards, particularly if
priced reasonably. Since the production and distribution cost of an
electronic document is essentially nil, they figured they'd make a lot
more money selling them cheaply than expensively, which is what they've
been doing. As far as I know, it's worked out even better than they'd
hoped.

 

[Ben Pfaff]

INCITS understands that the potential market for computer language
standards is much larger than that for other standards, particularly if
priced reasonably. Since the production and distribution cost of an
electronic document is essentially nil, they figured they'd make a lot
more money selling them cheaply than expensively, which is what they've
been doing. As far as I know, it's worked out even better than they'd
hoped.

Did they change that policy for 9899:2011? Or does that mean
that they are going to lower the C11 price from $228 to something
more reasonable, then?

 

[Keith Thompson]

Well that's a fine point. It will be a *copy* of a legal copy. Will that
work for you? Works for me! ;-)

Absolutely not.

(BTW, I posted here by accident, and re-posted to comp.std.c where this
is more topical. There was some discussion there.)

 

[lawrence.jones]

Did they change that policy for 9899:2011? Or does that mean
that they are going to lower the C11 price from $228 to something
more reasonable, then?

The $228 document is the ISO document that they're reselling -- I think
most of that money goes to ISO. Once it's adopted as an ANSI standard,
NCITS has the right to produce and sell their own version, which should
be reasonably priced. I'm not sure how long it takes to grind through
the administrative process until that happens, but nothing is done
quickly in the standards world.

 

[Rui Maciel]

He did specify that he was looking for legal copies.

If it is exclusively for personal use and doesn't have a noticeable impact
on the sale of the work of art, in some jurisdictions a copy downloaded from
anywhere is as "legal" as any other copy.


Rui Maciel

 

[lawrence.jones]

I've purchased several different ISO standards in the past few years, and
they've all been approximately 238CHF on both the ISO and ANSI websites. My
guess is that's the standard price for the most recent version of a single
software standard document.

The price is determined by the page count (not per page but by ranges).
Most software standards probably fall into the same bucket.

 

[Keith Thompson]

The price is determined by the page count (not per page but by ranges).
Most software standards probably fall into the same bucket.

It's a PDF. Surely it could be configured as a single page 8.5 inches
wide and 642 feet 7 inches long (length based on N1570 draft).

 

[BartC]

It's a PDF. Surely it could be configured as a single page 8.5 inches
wide and 642 feet 7 inches long (length based on N1570 draft).

That would be too unwieldy. You just have to use one normal-sized page (eg.
A4 or 8.5x11), but a microscopic font size.

 

[Noob]

Well that's a fine point. It will be a *copy* of a legal copy.
Will that work for you? Works for me! ;-)

In France, it is legal to provide a copy of a work protected by copyright
to anyone in one's "close circle" (as defined by case law) for personal use.

Some of you (mostly anglophones) have been brain-washed by "big media"(*)
and are waaay too docile when it comes to copyright.

(*) It's funny (in a sad way) that "big media" are the ACTUAL "thief"
in this story, pilfering and ransacking the public domain since $DEITY
invented the talking mouse.

Regards.

 

[James Kuyper]

In France, it is legal to provide a copy of a work protected by copyright
to anyone in one's "close circle" (as defined by case law) for personal use.

It's hard for me to believe that a perfect stranger whose only
connection to you is that he downloaded something that you made
available over the internet, could qualify as being in your "close
circle". If such a person did qualify, it would render copyright
meaningless.

Some of you (mostly anglophones) have been brain-washed by "big media"(*)
and are waaay too docile when it comes to copyright.

Some of us can use our own brains to understand the value of having
copyrights (and reasonable enforcement of same).

 

[Rui Maciel]

Some of us can use our own brains to understand the value of having
copyrights (and reasonable enforcement of same).

Notice that being supportive of unauthorized distribution of copyrighted
works exclusively for personal use does not mean that one fails to
"understand the value of having copyrights".

Moreover, supporting the totalitarian control of copyrighted works as it is
demanded by distributors does by no mean implies that one "understands the
value of having copyrights". In fact, it demonstrates an appalling lack of
understanding on the role of copyright in a developed society, that only
benefits distributors and no one else. And this includes the very same
people who actually produce copyrighted works. Hence, the appropriate
"brain-washed" reference.


Rui Maciel