Re: Free Learning

Stephen Downes provides the slides and audio of a keynote address he made recently in Barcelona at a conference on Free Knowledge, Free Technology: Education for a Free Information Society. Richard Stallman of the Free Software Foundation also made a keynote presentation.

Stephen spoke about Free Learning. The slides and audio make for an engaging, thought-provoking hour. Below are my comments addressed to Stephen.

My reaction concerns the meaning of free learning.

Free content is part of free learning. No problems there. But free learning means more than that. Suppose you created a learning community (however you want to define that). The content’s free, of course. But what, if anything, would a learner in your community need to pay? If the answer is zero, then how would you pull that off (who does pay and for what)? If the answer is not zero, then what would you charge a learner for?

Given the nature of the conference, I understand why you limited your discussion of free learning to free content. But without answers to the questions above, free learning remains a chimera.