Our discussions in class about OERs made me think about the authors involved in publishing materials for distance education courses. Although it is a great asset to any educational community to have an open education resource, what is the incentive for the author to give the information for free?
When authors spend their own time and money researching, writing and publishing a text, they are invested in how that information is used -- Texts often cost upwards of $100 to purchase a hard copy -- by putting the text online, it saves paper, and usually is available to students at a discount -- thereby still offering the author a modicum of monetary compensation. But once it is available for free, for everyone, where is the author's incentive.
Although it doesn't yet seem to be a major issue, I find this to be moderately reminiscent of the Napster issues of the late 90s. Where do you draw the line as to offering free information for those who need it, and offering free information for anyone who wants it?
Hi Stacey - this is a good question! I think providing some information for free, whether it be a textbook, a MOOC, a video series etc. the resource serves as a pointing mechanism for other paid resources offered by the author. For instance, if an author is trying to get their name out there, by providing a free textbook for lower level classes that is of high quality it may encourage instructors to purchase some of their paid resources that are at the upper level. It may incentive authors to provide extremely high quality free materials so that potential consumers value its worth and are willing to pay for future use, if that makes sense.
ReplyDeleteI know we were willing to create a Massive Open Online Course because we had the resources and wanted to provide education on the topic of terrorism to those in developing economies who experience terrorism on a daily basis but do not have the resources to join our paid programs. I would think a combination of wanting to share educational resources for the greater good and also market other paid resources would lead to quite a few high quality materials and courses offered for free.