Concepts

  1. Open Access
  2. Open Learning
    • The concept of Open Learning: creation of the British Open University in 1969; based on a concern for social justice in providing access to higher education (UK Labour party, the R. H. Harold Wilson, PM).
    • The concepts Distance Education and Open Learning seem to be phasing out as the new concepts of E-learning and Online Learning are phasing in. As levels of online learning increase and as e-learning becomes the dominant paradigm of the 21st century, open access to freely shared scholarly resources will be "the fuel that feeds the fire". (1)
    • Online Learning as process-based : A trend is emerging towards open and online learning which is based more on process-based, socioconstructivist theory rather than on product-based cognitivist theory and monolithic teaching packages ( Anderson, 2004; Power, 2007). The implication is that new learning environments which allow heightened levels of dialogue and negociated meaning between teachers and learners are conducive to quality learning experiences and knowledge construction. (2)

  3. Rival & non-rival goods From journalist and economics writer David Warsh (Boston Globe) on some concepts of economics for IP and OA generally: (This is a version of remarks presented early Nov at a meeting in Arlington, Virginia, organized by the Rand Institute, "The GatheringStorm and Its Implications for National Security.") Nov 12 2006 entitled "The World is What?" Global_nonrival_goods.pdf

Excerpts:

"In the last ten years, economists have learned to distinguish between rival and non-rival goods, and the degree to which their use by others may be excluded by those who create them. This is definitely not the familiar old distinction between public goods and private goods. It is a new and important way of dividing up the world in order to think more clearly about the sources of economic value. And it is described in my "Knowledge and the Wealth of Nations: a Story of Economic Discovery", a book that appeared earlier this year.benlker_wealth_of_nations.pdf

  • A rival good is one that can be possessed by only one person at a time: your lunch, for example; if I eat it, you cannot. A rival good can be shared, of course: I can cut my apple in half, let you use my pencil, give you my seat in the subway, lend you my car, or co-sign a loan. Ultimately, however, its corporealitry defines a rival good. There's a limit to how much it can be shared.

    A nonrival good, on the other hand, is characterized by the fact that that its use or consumption by one person or in one process doesn't reduce the amount of it that can be consumed by another. Once it has been created, once a certain fixed cost has been incurred, a nonrival good can be used over and over again with almost no additional cost.A non-rival good, in essence, is a design.

    Not surprisingly, excludability is usually the key to whether or not a nonrival good gets produced. (In the past, economists spoke of a new idea's "appropriability," which amounts to the same thing.) Patents,trademarks and copyrights exist to exclude nonpaying customers from the use of nonrival goods-- but so do secrets, locks and keys, tickets, applications programming interfaces, encryption devices, and rapid serial innovation. Manufacturing anything requires a vast array of inputs that are essentially nonrival: recipes, formulas, techniques, arrangements, designs, blueprints, procedures, texts, and so on. So naturally, a great many workers are employed in the excludability industry, from engineers and patent lawyers to railway conductors and game wardens. But knowledge definitely is nonrival and, at best, only temporarily excludable".

References

  1. Garrison, D.R. et Anderson, T. (2003). E-Learning in the 21st century: A Framework for Research and Practice . London/New York: Routledge Falmer. Moore, M.G. & Kearsley, G. (2004). Distance education: A systems view , 2nd Ed. Belmont, CA.: Wadworth.Perry, W. (1977). The Open University San Francisco: Jossey-Bass. Power, M. (2007) From Distance Education to E-Learning: a multiple case study on instructional design problems . E-Learning, Volume 4, Number 1, pp. 64-78.)

  2. Anderson, T. (2004). Teaching in an online learning context. In T. Anderson & F. Elloumi. Theory and Practice of Online Learning. Athasbasca, AB: Athabasca University. http://cde.athabascau.ca/online_book/. Power, M. (2007). Quality Online Education: a multi-case study on instructional design model development at a dual-mode university. American Educational Researchers Association, Instructional Design SIG, Chicago, Ill., 9-13 April.