I pointed to the UC Berkeley course schedule of classes that Berkeley is podcasting/webcasting a couple of weeks ago. At this point, I've made my course selections and have begun to survey, among others, the Astro C10 / LS C70U Introduction to General Astronomy.

This is just too good.

The possibilities are mind bending. Not to mention the (personally important) fact that creative acts can be related to the superimposition of what Ogle calls "idea spaces", these courses are exceptional raw material. Check this book out:

Then there are the business opportunities:

• Distance learning extensions leveraging existing resources
• The increased value proposition to students enrolled traditionally
• The marketing value of exposing the best professors to a broader audience
• Third party certification of students using UC Berkeley content (copywrite issues certainly, but enforceable globally?)
• And more

When I watch this stuff at home (the webcasts from home, the podcasts I listen to in the car), I'm constantly using my other monitor to search for material that relates to and augments the course material. I then tag it using the course number (currently I mark them as private, but I may change that habit -- I'm not sure why it got started). I'd love to share tags with other students. 

Here's a strange one: I'm getting to know the names of some of the students. I'm wondering how their grades are going to turn out. I'm rooting for them.

As the trend this represents spreads (and I do hope it does), innovation will skyrocket. It's such a shame companies have no clue how to manage and reward creative individuals and teams. Yes there are the structural and corporate cultural limitations at play, but still. So much will be wasted.