Online Degree is a commodity

Reading various comments made on online degree, I can confirm that there is a widely adapted perception that online education is a commodity.

Over the next 10 years, Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) will move all its existing coursework on to the internet in a project called OpenCourseWare (OCW) . The first group of courses are set to be published on the internet on 30 September, including subjects like anthropology, biology, chemistry and computer science. There will be no online degrees for sale, however. Instead, it will offer thousands of pages of information, available to anyone around the globe at no cost, as well as hours and hours of streaming video lectures, seminars and experiments.

Source - QuickLinks - e-Learning

MIT currently does not offer any online degree program, nor has she announced any plan to offer online degree programs in the future. If MIT decides to do so, it does not mean that MIT starts selling online degree programs. However, the referenced column suggests that offering online degree programs is equivalent to selling online degree programs. This is a common perception though.

A Labour MP has condemned a failed online degree scheme as a 'shameful waste' of tens of millions of pounds of public money. Dr Ian Gibson, who chairs the science and technology committee at the Commons, called the UK's e-university 'an absolute disaster'. The online university - called UKeU - was set up a year ago but failed to attract enough students. The plug was pulled on it in February and it is being quietly dismantled.

Source - QuickLinks - e-Learning

It is true that number of universities invested substantial amount of money in online education, but many of them decided that their online education does not have future and they stopped investing and terminated all programs related online education. I live nearby University of California, Santa Barbara, and the university has an extension center. The extension center started offering online courses several years ago, but they stopped offering these courses within a couple of years. This is one of many examples. Nonetheless, the fact that number of universities' investment did not come to fruition does not imply that online degree has no value; many universities simply could not come up with a sustainable online education model this time. It is a bit of stretch to come to conclude that no university has come up with a sustainable online education model, and also it is a bit of stretch to come to conclude that ones offering online degree programs are simply selling online degree programs to generate profit, i.e., treating online degree as a commodity.