The Ghost of eLearning Past (2000)
and the Ghost of eLearning Future (2001)

Learning became a management issue. Senior managers began to see training as an investment, not a cost, and that “eLearning,” whatever that is, might be important.

“eLearning” became the buzzword of choice, shoving aside online learning, web-based training, and distance education. At Online Learning 1999, only one vendor was offering eLearning. At Online Learning 2000, hundreds of vendors were touting eLearning. Confusion reigned. Most “eLearning solutions” were fictional Rube Goldberg assemblages, glued together with virtual Scotch tape, bailing wire, and bullshit.

The Department of Defense SCORMed into the standards battle, renewing the faith that some day eLearning will be plug-and-play & interoperable.

Training magazine reported that “a number of the brightest and most experienced people in the training business have begun to say, publicly, that its [instructional design’s] day has come and gone.” Traditional instructional design no longer works except for very fundamental courses because the subject matter changes before the course is completed.

A large black monolith will be discovered on the moon, sending signals to Jupiter. Eight training companies will immediately claim the monolith is part of their “blended solution” and that the transmissions to Jupiter are part of a rogue LMS.

An eBusiness does whatever necessary to improve the performance of its value chain. Last year, eLearning was primarily for employees. Next year we’ll see a lot more eLearning for customers, VARs, and suppliers.

More savvy buyers are going to see through those Rube Goldberg systems mentioned above and demand integration. For large organizations, enterprise eLearning will become the killer app, bringing together a variety of learning methods, content sources, and knowledge objects – all aware of who the learner is and what the learner’s after.

Peer-to-peer technology will create knowledge management without a manager, just as weblogs are creating a web without a weaver. Users/SMEs will author their own content. Collaborative filtering and ratings systems will float the good stuff to the top in a decentralized (think Gnutella) environment. Groove probably fits in here, too. (And I’m still waiting for the industry to recognize the importance of Instant Messaging in the business environment.)

eLearning and Knowledge Management will converge because the cost of integrating organization-specific knowledge is dropping and because generic learning is not as effective as varietal (i.e. what’s required by your job).

In the .edu community, faculty roles will change. Administrators will realize that lecturing on basic topics is not the best use of their resources. (The New York Times recently reported that two-dozen basic courses account for half of all college enrollment-hours. When Unext or Cognitive Arts or Disney have come out with the exciting, definitive, sim-based course in, say, Economics 101, no one’s going to choose to listen to some grad student instead, are they?)

Corporate purchasing will become much more sophisticated. A couple of years ago, training was an ordinary annual expense because individual courses didn’t cost much or last very long. On the other hand, eLearning infrastructure costs a lot and will be treated as a capital expenditure to be allocated over a number of years. Capital expenditures require solid plans for the future and financial metrics. (I’m expanding Internet Time Group to help companies draw up strategic eLearning plans and to make wise choices.)