Marginal Revolution: Should professors podcast their lectures on-line?

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Should professors podcast their lectures on-line?

John Palmer, the Eclectic Econoclast, wonders whether he should podcast his lectures on-line; be sure to scroll down to his point #7. Here is a recent article about podcasting university lectures (who owns the rights? who should own the rights?).

A few weeks ago, Russ Roberts at Cafe Hayek asked whether there was much demand for economics podcasts. Being excessively terse by nature, I feel ill-suited to the podcast medium. And I fear that podcast lectures would make some of my students stay home and also would make me more self-conscious in class. But what do you all think? Comments are open.

Posted by Tyler Cowen on October 25, 2005 at 06:20 AM in Education | Permalink

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Comments

I would think the lectures would or should be public domain. I don't think it would lower the value of a college education and professors who wish to retain their rights to their lectures just shouldn't podcast.

Q: Should professors podcast thier lectures?
A: If they want to.

I'm brilliant.

Posted by: joshg at Oct 25, 2005 8:38:26 AM

Only if they complement, rather than substitute your weblog postings. Text
is great- can scroll up and down and to go back to points already
read. Lectures are useful when they are interactive. Just my viewpoint.

Posted by: XyZ at Oct 25, 2005 8:42:30 AM

Hello,

It depends: from the standpoint of students or the standpoint of Internauts?

I'm all for academic podcasts... if the professors wish so (and if universities can afford the webhosting server costs).

There's a blogger out there who does MP3 interviews ---RadioEconomics.com. I downloaded files, and never had time to listen to them. You know why?

MP3 files are not scannable. And user testing show that Internauts first scan and SOMETIMES read. Scanning is what it is all about.

A Web page is easily scannable, especially if the writer has put emphasis on his/her most important sentences ---in bold. Technology, like Google Cache, can also help the scanning.

Conclusion: Professors would be better off publishing their papers as Web documents instead as PDF files. That sounds to me a more urgent task than academic podcasting.

Again, I am not a Tyler Cowen's student, I speak as an Internaut.

Best regards,

Chris. F. Masse

Posted by: Chris. F. Masse .COM at Oct 25, 2005 9:03:57 AM

Against the "students won't come to my lectures" argument, just post the podcasts on a fairly significant delay, like two weeks or something. That way they're there for posterity / your students to go back and study from to make sure they didn't miss anything, but they still have to go to class if they want to keep up to speed on what's going on in class.

Posted by: Jason at Oct 25, 2005 9:29:39 AM

when i was a student i took a class in which the professor:

a. taught directly from a powerpoint slide show
and
b. published the powerpoint slides on the class website.

we stopped going to class.

Posted by: will at Oct 25, 2005 9:30:10 AM

Two comments:
1) Even as a student who never reached 50% attendance in any undergrad semester, I probably wouldn't have cared about podcast availability. I just didn't have the interest/ability to sit quietly and listen for 1.5 hours at a time. Only classes with heavy audience participation held my interest. So I doubt I would have listened to the podcasts either.

2) As a Internaut (I like that word) I would love to have some of your lectures available as podcasts. I've got an MBA but my MacroEcon class was the most poorly taught of all the core classes, and if you put 2 or 3 'best of' your economics lectures up on marginalrevolution, I'd love to listen to them.

Posted by: Lou Wainwright at Oct 25, 2005 9:47:18 AM

Being a student and also disabled, I cannot take my own notes in classes. I was planning on buying an iPod and iTalk attachment to record classes. having lectures as podcasts would be great. Sure it may cause some students not to come to class as often, but my instructors already post powerpoint slides to download anyway.

Posted by: Philip Dunham at Oct 25, 2005 10:19:57 AM

The web, blogs, and podcasts are great for those of us outside the university system. I'm sure some institutions will be cautious about publication of podcasts, just as some were cautious with earlier technologies. As an "eyball" (or "ear") that doesn't worry me. Some will step forward and that will be enough.

I guess I could hasten the process by predicting that the early publishers will end up "owning it."

Posted by: odograph at Oct 25, 2005 10:29:30 AM

Hi! I'm a 4th year student of Cybernetics, Econometrics and Economics. I'd love to be able to go online and listen to my teachers' lectures, if only to help me understand the notes I take in class.
The problem is, I think, that the kind of "mathematics heavy-lifting" we're doing today doesn't translate well into audio. Sure, some teachers read-out the equations they write on the blackboard, but they can't read everything.

Regarding language style, efficiency and other considerations, I think that the lectures published by the Mises Institute are a good example. They're mostly colloquial, and Austrians doesn't do math (mostly) so maybe it's not a good model for the mainstream, but an experienced lecturer, such as Block, can really "sell it".

Posted by: Gabriel Mihalache at Oct 25, 2005 10:31:34 AM

I agree with the earlier poster who suggested podcasts at a delay. I'd love to be able to get in-class lectures from economists around the country/world. I had a great undergraduate education at Oregon, wonderful faculty who taught well and always treated even lowly undergrads with care and respect, but the work-a-day world is slowly sapping my skills and with my own laziness to blame for middling undergrad performance, it'll be a year before I can really start a program here. It'd be a great way to stay sharp without having to read too many books or papers. Come home from work, watch the ball game, listen to Tyler's lecture about business cycles. Add a nice micro, and that's a heck of an evening.

Posted by: Timothy at Oct 25, 2005 10:39:46 AM

If your lectures are anywhere near as good as your blog, I would definately listen to your podcasts when I went home after work.

If I were a student I wouldn't find a podcast to be a substitute for class. If I have to spend an hour listening to the podcast I might as well spend that hour in class where I can ask questions and talk with you. Especially since I would be paying millions of dollars for it. Not to mention, equations and math and supply and demand graphs don't translate well to podcast. This would be problem as a student trying to pass tests, but as a casual auditing podcast listener, it wouldn't bother me I think.

Posted by: eric at Oct 25, 2005 11:07:41 AM

Well, just yesterday I listened to a few minutes of a random macro lecture (recorded on my iPod) while I was studying for your exam, and I heard the Grinch question, which allowed me to think about it before the test. So I guess I officially find having a record of the lectures useful.

Posted by: Adam Martin at Oct 25, 2005 11:07:52 AM

How is it terribly different than allowing the students to tape record a lecture (which is what we did during my mid-90's college years)?

I often recorded lectures of classes that I attended so that I could pay more attention to the gist of the lecture rather than worrying about writing one point while listening to another. I don't recall any professor minding, but I always asked beforehand. It was a fairly common practice.

As to missing classes: a tape was invaluable if you missed a class, but I don't recall any impact on attendance. Professors who read out of the book (sad, but true) or added little to the materials tended to have really low attendance, those that were engaging didn't. The chance to ask questions, especially on tough material, keeps you going.

A podcast just sounds like an improvement on distribution, not a shift in approach. The only real change is the decision to make these available publicly, or to find a way to make it so that only your students have access (having them emailed upon request, for example).

Posted by: Brad at Oct 25, 2005 11:15:11 AM

Podcasting lectures might be a good thing, but I'm not sure it's perfectly legal.

As long as the professor is paid for teaching those courses, their copyright probably belongs ONLY to the university. (Just think about the copyright for the software one writes for one's employer.) So I would not jump to publishing my lectures without asking for my employer's permission first.

Posted by: Ervin at Oct 25, 2005 11:37:55 AM

I personally find podcasts too slow - unless the speaker is Pagliaesque in her rate of speaking, I can learn more, faster, reading.

Posted by: nobody at Oct 25, 2005 12:00:42 PM

My thoughts:

- By making your lectures freely downloadable you are creating a positive externality - previously consumers had to pay (tuition) to hear them.

- If you consider listening to lectures to have value, distinct from their ability to further a degree (ie value to non-students), then you are disaggregating/unbundling degrees from lectures.

- If you were to decide to charge for podcasts you are internalizing this positive externality - enclosing the newly created commons. Now there are two products to purchase - potential lecture-consumers who were not willing to bear the cost of listening in person (ie being a student) can now execute this mutually beneficial exchange with you the lecturer.

- Ownership of intellectual property of the lecture would be determined by your employment contract. If podcasting (particularly for sale) became common practice among professors, the clause covering this would be an increasing focus of negotiation between professors and universities.

- An active, liquid market for lecture podcasts, driven by supply and demand, could itself disaggregate historically bundled duties of professors. Professors who are good at lecturing but lousy at research, for example, could specialize and be compensated for that.

- Podcasting in particular and Internet technology in general has a broadening affect on markets. It could be that a few rock-star lecturers could eventually dominate the market for lectures (at least for stardardizable subjects). The lecture consumption may move towards "long tail" Pareto distribution - as is already the case with discreetly consumable intellectual property such as books and music. Reduction of transaction costs accelerates this trend.

- An Economist article earlier this year (http://www.economist.com/displaystory.cfm?story_id=3690585) discussed a trend towards the separation of instruction and testing, exemplified by increasing popularity of professional vocational education (such as the CFA) and "virtual" universities (such as the University of Phoenix). The sale of lecture-podcasts contributes to and accelerates this trend, where increased market efficiency should create value for both consumers and suppliers.

- The lecture-sale market could approximate either the entertainment market or the instruction portion of the separated education market, depending on the content and purpose of the lecture.

- Presumably the lecture-sale market would reward lecturers to the extent that they facilitate standardized economic achievement (such as CFA or University of Phoenix) or entertainment value (as in CD/MP3/digital radio). This could reduce the demand for and the value of the PhD, which is not strictly required for either. Similarly this could increase the value of effective instruction (students will purchase test prep courses based on their ability to increase test scores, independent of formal qualifications of internal staff).

- Ownership of intellectual property of lectures could approximate that in either the media industry (where artists own IP) or the instruction/test-prep industry (where firms own IP). Free content will be more common in the entertainment industry than in the instruction/test-prep industry.

Posted by: Graham Lawlor at Oct 25, 2005 12:03:42 PM

Apple should have a feature on the iPod to play podcasts (or any audio file) faster, because I agree they're way too slow. The speed-up feature on MythTV is really useful, I usually watch shows at 1.4x speed or so. Man, listening to those Radioeconomics podcasts is like watching grass grow, I think I could go 2x. I guess it depends on whether you're hearing something you already know (bring on the 2x), or learning something new (bring on the pause button).

I think you can just cut samples from the audio file to achieve this; it would probably sound better if you re-sample, but doing this on-the-fly would be processor-intensive. There are already software tools to speed up audio but it's kind of a pain to have to re-encode everything before you put it on your iPod, hence my desire for an on-iPod feature.

Posted by: Paul N at Oct 25, 2005 12:58:45 PM

As an undergraduate the only class that I taped and listened to regularly was American History until 1877 (this is my secret love). I used to listen to the lecture in the evenings while winding down (I had no T.V.). I didn't miss a point during the semester. I feel like this was a great benefit, but I am not willing to invest in recording graduate lectures, myself. As a test, it seems that you could password protect your lectures, and see if people not enrolled in the class would pay to be given access to the lectures, but this would involve a fixed cost (clearing payments). I personally pay on the order of $40-60 for a full semester worth of lectures (24-48 half-hour lectures) that have been screened by a company guaranteeing my satisfaction (most of these are on ancient and medieval history). I am not aware of the price discrimination techniques you could use to extract surplus from your monopoly. I observe markets in lectures; therefore I imagine there is a pricing mechanism which would be available with property rights.
When studying for Exams, I often search other professors’ websites. For Math Econ this semester I found a professor who puts his lecture notes online, using the same book that we are using in that class. It has helped me on occasion. If there were lectures online, my curiosity would drive me to cross-pollinate my understanding of a subject (bias towards either the ones that I have more enjoyment in, or am struggling in because the additional consumption is likely to be leisure or remedial). I think that it has a chance to further distort the distribution, more observations in the upper tail (lowering frequency in the lower), for those with less time constraints.
I have listened to roughly 30 hours of lectures on the “Mises Institute” website, and would be likely to listen to more as content increases.
Ergo:
I think there are people who would consume the lectures, a smaller pool that would pay for them, and some benefits to a subgroup of your students.

Posted by: Michael Thomas at Oct 25, 2005 1:08:50 PM

I think it's a brilliant idea, one that I hadn't thought of, but that I would love to take advantage of in the future (especially GMU econ profs).

And I agree with earlier comments that a delay in releasing the podcasts would hopefully deter students from skipping class, while benefiting a great deal of casual listeners and armchair econ lovers.

Hoping the idea comes to fruition,

Kyle

Posted by: Kyle at Oct 25, 2005 1:48:33 PM

The world needs as much economic education on the Web as possible! If your podcasts save even one life from economic destitution of bad economic policy, isn't it worth it ;)

Posted by: Mr. Econotarian at Oct 25, 2005 1:55:47 PM

As for how it affects you during class, I suppose that's something you would know more than us. I'm not sure why being taped would make you more self conscious, though. It could very well feel strange the first few times, but I imagine you'd get used to it.

As for the class-attendance issue: why does it matter? For some professors, who don't involve much discussion in their lectures, such taped lectures could very well replace the in-class experience for many students, though I fail to see what the negative aspect is there. For others (such as you), who can be very heavily discussion based, those who don't show up are only hurting themselves. Either way, we're talkin' postgraduate level, so they're all adults. They paid their money. If they don't want to maximize how much they get out of the experience that's their problem.

Frankly, I'm surprised this is still an issue these days. At my law school in NYC many professors would routinely tape lectures for students (I believe the tapes were put on reserve for folks to copy). One even admitted that he got into the habit so that he wouldn't ever forget to tape the lecture on one of the many Jewish holidays which weren't school holidays (which, in NYC, meant that half the class was gone for the day). Usually they would just designate a student to start/stop the machine for them. Anyway....

Posted by: Mike Kohler at Oct 25, 2005 2:02:24 PM

Well, I would listen to it. I've subscribed to Bob on History, and I downloaded one of the RadioEconomics casts.

Of course, I've paid for taped lectures from the Teaching Company before (lots and lots), so of course I'm the type of person who would download these things.

If you're concerned about students not coming to class or not responding in class (though unless you miked your class, you likely wouldn't be able to catch the responses anyway), why not wait until the semester is over before releasing recordings.

Posted by: meep at Oct 25, 2005 2:03:15 PM

I've been recording your class, and I listen to it later at night to fill in all the stuff I missed in my notes. It IS a great help, but I think it helps simply because I have already heard the lecture earlier.

In the end, as long as you let your students record your lectures, I don't think it matters to them: people who think it helps to playback the lectures, buy a recorder and record lectures themselves.

Posted by: Ali Hasanain at Oct 25, 2005 2:58:47 PM

Apologies in case this double-posts. Anyways, I think this issue has already been fairly well established for 40 years or so. It depends on the lecturer.

http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0738202983/103-9533985-7882266?v=glance&n=283155&v=glance

Posted by: agm at Oct 26, 2005 2:36:59 AM

Lately, been listening to Feynman Lectures at work. Obviously, most lecturers don't have Feynman's penash. Still, be awesome to listen to lectures by those I'll never take a course from. Natural extension of OCW, LANL, whatever. To Gabriel, I'd cite Feynman as an instance of lots of maths, where you get a great deal - not everything - from the audio.

In sum, need more content! MUST HAVE MORE CONTENT!!

Posted by: bwanadik at Oct 26, 2005 9:52:14 AM

Incidentally, Radioeconomics should make rss feed titles mp3 links; it's absurd to subscribe to a podcast feed, and then have to visit the http to download the file.

Posted by: bwanadik at Oct 28, 2005 9:56:30 AM

do you plan to restrict who can access the podcasts? ie if I am not a stanford student, can I hear what you have to say?

what was the negative again?

more content available on the web = good for the world. see:
http://web.mit.edu/ocw/

Posted by: hugh. at Oct 29, 2005 12:22:37 AM

1. Assuming that students interact during the class, they'd also get recorded, and that could raise FERPA privacy concerns. (I'm not saying it -should- be an issue, but it might come up.)

2. The Chronicle of Higher Education just did a piece on this issue: http://chronicle.com/weekly/v52/i10/10a03901.htm

Posted by: John at Oct 30, 2005 3:21:31 PM

I have just started playing with podcasts (my story here http://learnecon.blogspot.com/2005/11/teaching-and-learning-economics-with.html )and think their can be a substantial market. In my case, I believe that short on-point lively podcasts can be very useful in answering questions for students, especially the use of these to build up a FAQ file.

Posted by: Steve Myers at Nov 4, 2005 2:14:15 PM

Yes they should pod cast their lectures. I am a student of economics and would love to be able to plug in economic lectures as I drive to work and sit in traffic. To have an alternative to commercial radio that enforces what I am studying would fantastic and convenient. Professors differ in their lecturing style as well. Some times the student gets a green professor and could benefit from supplemental lectures.

Posted by: Patrick at Nov 13, 2005 7:45:12 PM

Yes, I think teachers, particularly at the college level should create podcast lectures. At the least, podcast supplemental lectures that perhaps go into refined nuances regarding the main topics. I think well structured podcasts would enhance almost any class, and also free the teacher up to cover more material.

As for students not showing up because the lectures are on podcasts, this shouldn't be a problem at the college level, students should only be responsible for the material rather then the attendance. However, there should be no mercy for those that don't know the material completely and don't show up either.

Yes, teachers should maintain copyright and the right to restrict distribution as they see fit.

This has been a drive by posting ... Good Luck.

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