Auditing Classes at M.I.T., on the Web and Free (thru Davenetics)
"M.I.T. plans on Wednesday to announce a 10-year initiative, apparently the biggest of its kind, that intends to create public Web sites for almost all of its 2,000 courses and to post materials like lecture notes, problem sets, syllabuses, exams, simulations, even video lectures. Professors’ participation will be voluntary, but the university is committing itself to post sites for all its courses, at a cost of up to $100 million.
[…]
Selling content for profit, or trying in some ways to commercialize one of the core intellectual activities of the university," Professor Lerman said, "seemed less attractive to people at a deep level than finding ways to disseminate it as broadly as possible."
It’s the end of free content on the web blah blah blah