There seem to be some interesting parallels between this debate and the Napster / RIAA debate.
We're entering an era where all content and knowledge is easily record able, searchable, and distributable to the masses. This is already having an impact on traditional content industries (music, video) and we can expect these copyright battles to play out wherever information has value. Educational content, due to it's high relative cost, is a logical target.
Personally, I think that our higher education system has already worked very hard to defend it's revenue streams... and I think that this practice, intentional or not, is partly responsible for the growing divide between those-who-can-afford tuition and those-who-can-not.
Things have changed, and most areas of our education system simply haven't. We should be able to provide great education for 1/10th the cost of 20 years ago by fully using distance-learning technologies... but instead the cost of (higher) education has been skyrocketing. I don't want to criticize all educational institutions for falling behind -- many are working on novel technologies for distance and computer learning.
However, it seems that the use of these systems is minimal outside of a few major players.
So, what's next? Are we going to be distributing lecture notes on Gnutella... or could the outcome of the Napster court case have an impact on our right to distribute educational content as well?
This raises some very interesting intellectual rights issues.
Slashdot Mirror
We're entering an era where all content and knowledge is easily record able, searchable, and distributable to the masses. This is already having an impact on traditional content industries (music, video) and we can expect these copyright battles to play out wherever information has value. Educational content, due to it's high relative cost, is a logical target.
Personally, I think that our higher education system has already worked very hard to defend it's revenue streams... and I think that this practice, intentional or not, is partly responsible for the growing divide between those-who-can-afford tuition and those-who-can-not.
Things have changed, and most areas of our education system simply haven't. We should be able to provide great education for 1/10th the cost of 20 years ago by fully using distance-learning technologies... but instead the cost of (higher) education has been skyrocketing. I don't want to criticize all educational institutions for falling behind -- many are working on novel technologies for distance and computer learning.
However, it seems that the use of these systems is minimal outside of a few major players.
So, what's next? Are we going to be distributing lecture notes on Gnutella... or could the outcome of the Napster court case have an impact on our right to distribute educational content as well?
This raises some very interesting intellectual rights issues.