I remember when I bought my copy of the Abramowitz and Stegun book for 12 $ canadian in Montr?al,
Indeed. Abramowitz & Stegun now available for free electronically, as well as about $20 hardcopy, even though it represents more work, and also more typesetting and printing, and also more objectively valuable, than the Ramanujan notebooks for over $1000. What's the $980 paying for? Why? Well, by law, Abramowitz & Stegun was not copyrighted or copyrightable since produced largely by US govt employees. So here's an idea. Revise US law so that any publication produced by anybody funded by a US govt grant, is not copyrightable. One result: Ramanujan notebooks will be available for low cost. Also, most scientific papers. Also, then NSF grants will actually be paying for something useful for the taxpayers. Oh, and guess how much of all those $1000s, was ever given to Ramanujan himself? Zilch. The defenders of this price heap great praise upon this wonderful work and seem to think price is justified due to author labor. A different view: the so-called authors are parasites, the true creator is getting zilch.