29 January 2009
Tech Tips: Booko
This is an article about the shop-assistant service, Booko (and this sentance is just an excuse to insert a link in the header)
Perhaps one of the most frustrating things about the ‘back to school’ phase of semester (ie. the first three or four weeks) revolves around textbooks and bookshops.
I have never worked at a bookstore, or owned a bookstore, or really had anything to do with them other than purchasing my books from a bookstore. I don’t know the extreme challenges of the bookstore business. But for some reason, despite the fact that a rush of business occurs at about the same two or three times each and every year, a number of university bookstores are unable to cope with demand.
So this year I decided to be clever and order a majority of my books off the internet. Not only can I get these babies delivered *to my house* but at time’s they’re nearly half the price! Except, unfortunately, for a number of different reasons my brilliant plan wasn’t working so well.
So, a few days ago, after I complained about amazon.com not willing to ship some things out to me (seriously, is the bookstore business some kind of inexplicable black hole of commerce?) on a popular micro-blogging service, someone suggested that I give booko.com.au a try.
Well, Booko helped. It helped a lot. It rocks.
What is Booko?
Booko is a site dedicated to finding you the cheapest prices for your books online.
Why Does Booko Rock?
The book that I was looking for was ‘Successful Dissertations and Theses’ and my uni bookstore let me know that it would cost roughly $60 and take two to three weeks to be shipped here.
Amazon.com was going to charge me roughly $50.00 – and would take about the same time to be delivered out here. What’s more, when I tried to pick up a cheaper second hand version ($30′ish) it wouldn’t ship out to Australia at all (in Amazon’s defense, we have spiders here).
Booko, however, found a great list of retailers that would get me the book. In the end, I ended up paying $25 and it is now on a boat or a plane or a camel or something on its way out to me.
Great success.
A Ray of Light in a Nasty World
A simple service, but an extremely helpful one. Of course, given the extreme dangers of the mysterious book trade industry, I shouldn’t count my chickens. I’ve been billed for my purchase but it hasn’t yet arrived.
But assuming the book does get here – and I’m confident it will – this is a service that all students should have a go at. If you know which books you are going to pick up this semester, make sure you check the prices on Booko first.
You could save yourself a buttload of money, but more importantly you can avoid the nasty, dog eat dog world of academic literature.
It’s like your own personal little Ari Gold working on your behalf to make sure you get the perfect deal in an imperfect business.
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