

Coursera to offer students free online textbooks, with conditions - sonabinu
http://www.washingtonpost.com/local/education/free-online-textbooks-with-conditions/2013/05/07/b49364ce-b761-11e2-92f3-f291801936b8_story.html?hpid=z9

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radicalbyte
I've made a point of buying textbooks when they've been written by the person
giving the course (and when they've taught me something).

Like many here I can afford it, and it's my way of saying "thank you" for the
effort.

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cstavish
That's cool, as long as the professor isn't a scumbag. A lot of my friends
have been stuck with some dude who requires students to buy new editions of
his book each year (he makes just enough changes to get away with it).

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mtowle
Worst I've had was a chemistry 101 prof. With the knowledge, I'm sure, that
chem 101 and bio 101 are far and away the most popular classes that fulfill
science gen ed reqs, the professor chose not to write his own textbook but to
create a (horrible) DVD with all the class content on it. Functionally, we're
basically talking about chapters of powerpoint presentations with recordings
by one of his T.A.'s explaining each diagram.

This was a while ago, so I can't say how many sections of his 101 class there
were (though he also taught 102), but we're talking in the neighborhood of
300-600 total students. $45 per DVD. Which you had to buy, because everything
other than the exams (i.e. homework, quizzes) could only be submitted
online...with a unique key from the DVD you bought.

So assuming no royalties (he made the DVD himself), $45 * we'll say 400
students = $18,000 per semester. Minus the overhead of blank DVD's, to be
fair.

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tokenadult
This will greatly improve the appeal of Massive Open Online Courses for people
like me who would rather read than listen to a lecture. I can read faster than
almost anyone can talk. And a well selected set of readings by several authors
provides more perspective on a subject than a lecture series by one lecturer.
I really like the effort that Coursera, Udacity, edX, etc. are making to offer
free online courses on college-level subjects. I will be better able to time-
shift my studying and learn more faster if the courses include readings as
well as video lectures. Three cheers for Coursera doing this.

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tjr
Genuinely curious, not trying to be snarky: why not just read a book then?
What additional value do you get out of taking the course?

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SatvikBeri
For me, the automatically graded exercise and access to a forum of people
who're working on the same information are two major bonuses. Add in the fact
that more and more employers are recognizing Coursera courses and it's a huge
value-add.

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pixelcort
Wait, I'm confused. Isn't the whole point of free MOOCs is that their content
is open source, freely modifiable by other teachers, or anyone?

Or was I just under a rock when MOOCs were being popularized?

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mcintyre1994
Hmm, not really. The current best-of-breed are taught by professors at big
establishments, some of them basically mirror the university class they're
currently teaching. They're usually videos too, so they're not exactly
modifiable nope. They do tend to keep the content up after the classes though
in my experience, so you could consider them open source.

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dhawalhs
edX's 6.002x: Circuits and Electronics also provides the textbook for free
with similar conditions. The textbook in question is The Foundations of Analog
and Digital Electronic Circuits ($79.99 on Amazon) by Agarwal and Lang
published by Elsevier

