Learning for Free from iTunes U

  History in modern life 
  Originally uploaded by yanni

The LA Times in an article entitled The iPod Lecture Circuit talks about how iTunes is making hundreds of lectures from elite academic institutions like U.C. Berkley, Harvard, Yale, Duke, Stanford, MIT and others, available online for free.  28 colleges and universities now post select courses without charge. 

The article states, "Retirees in Long Beach and Weaverville, Calif., halibut fishermen in Alaska, data entry clerks in London, casting agents in New York -- all separated from the classroom by age, distance or circumstance -- are learning from some of the world's top scholars.

Apple began working with Duke University in late 2004 to broadcast classes from its website using iTunes software and has expanded the service to other schools. Separately, some universities started putting lectures on the iTunes store in the form of podcasts, which are free video or audio recordings that anyone can download to their computer or iPod.

The downloads have surged since May, when Apple began featuring lessons on the iTunes home page under the heading iTunes U. For example, the 86 courses UC Berkeley offers are now being downloaded 50,000 times a week, up from 15,000 before Apple's promotion."

You can find some lectures from some great divinity schools, like Duke Divinity and Yale Divinity. Check it out.

Comments

[Jason Clark]

Thanks for the heads up on those.

[Jake Bouma]

I was just preparing to write a post about this. I listened to William Sloan Coffin's speech from 2005 on politics and religion for free via iTunes and wanted to spread the love!

[JR Woodward]

Jason,

No problem. It's cool to get a little taste of what things are like from these different Universities.

Jake,

That is cool man. You should post about it. I'll have to check out Coffin's speech when I get some free time.

[Jonathan King]

Thanks for the tip, JR! This is sweet.