Are Universities Going the Way of CDs and Cable TV?

Like mass media and mass commerce, the average university is on the brink of collapse. Its structure is a rotting legacy of the Industrial Age. For years, anybody who wanted to learn on their own lacked the means to do so. Now, anybody with an internet connection has access to information. Harvard and Stanford will be okay, but dark days are ahead ... See more

Even as the cost of tuition increased, the value of university went unquestioned. Colleges bundled education and signaling. Students who thrived in boring classes signaled traits to employers, like conscientiousness, intelligence and conformity. Now, due to the proliferation of information on the internet and the rise of affordable and effective al... See more

From here, we will see an ecosystem grow up around these online offerings that moves them up the product performance curve over time. In ten years, we may very well see three main options - either you pay up to go to an Ivy League school, get an affordable education with the full college experience at a state school, or learn primarily online and r... See more

Many people assume that the disruption will come from the very top, as students flock to courses offered by Ivy League institutions. Yet, this assumes that “education” is the primary product that will be digitized. The very fact that schools like Harvard and Stanford are willing to give that education away for free is evidence that these institutio

... See more