Ethernet daddy: online education poised to transform the world

[FarCenter]

During an interview at the Ethernet Innovation Summit in Mountain View, California, Ethernet inventor Robert Metcalfe was asked what surprises were on the horizon due to the ever more pervasive advance of the internet.

"The most exciting surprise, I think, is going to be MOOCs," said Metcalfe on Wednesday, referring to online education – Massively Open Online Courses. "Education is about to be disrupted, like iTunes did to music."

Some educators have called MOOCs a bad idea, raising the objection that online education destroys the one-to-one relationships between teachers and students. Metcalfe disagrees.

"Here's how I handle those [objections]," he said. "It goes back to the invention of another 'bad idea' – the BOOC, which is spelled today B, O, O, K. It was obviously a very bad idea, because before BOOCs, we would sit around the campfire and we would hear the story directly from the storyteller, but now we have these damn BOOC things.

"You've read The Great Gatsby but you've never met F. Scott Fitzgerald," he said. "That's a problem – so the BOOC is really a bad idea."

Dropping his facetious approach, Metcalfe spoke of the advantages that MOOCs such as Udacity, edX, and Coursera bring to education. "For one thing," he said, "education is not going to occur between the ages of five and 22 anymore. Education is going to be a life-long learning thing."

http://www.theregister.co.uk/2013/05/22/metcalfe_on_moocs/

[Robb]

1. What an interesting dude.

[FarCenter]

4. Here's a recent bio -- seems to have sold the farm in Maine and taken a professorship at UT Austin

Bob Metcalfe accepts professorship at University of Texas, slows down investing pace at Polaris

http://www.boston.com/business/technology/innoeco/2010/11/bob_metcalfe_accepts_professor.html

[msongs]

2. w/online there is no guarantee that the work was actually done, compared to in-class nt

[Buzz Clik]

3. In some ways, this is fantastic.

It will open education at a higher level to people who never have such access. It will ensure that only the most highly motivated and disciplined students will advance. There's nothing wrong with that.

The costs will drop dramatically. No brick and mortar to pay for. No instructors to pay for. Not a bad thing at all.

The quality of the courses should be outstanding. Crappy course materials from unmotivated instructors will be a thing of the past.

There are courses and disciplines, however, that simply don't do well with the MOOC approach. I most definitely want my engineers taught at the highest level with hands-on training at the finest institutions. Human and animal medicine are best taught by the best with access to the best hospitals.

By and large, it's a great idea.

[HiPointDem]

5. yes, it's going to change the world; it's going to privatize education and allow transnational

corporations to control it vertically and horizontally.

fuck metcalfe and all his fellow technocratic capitalists.