Can MOOC's Help Sell Textbooks?

Colleges aren’t the only enterprises interested in the possibilities of free, online courses. Publishers have begun to investigate whether so-called MOOC’s, or massive open online courses, can help them reach new readers and sell more books.

For the moment, providers of the classes encourage professors not to require students to buy texts, in order to keep access as open as possible. So publishers can’t count on MOOC’s to generate a course-adoption sales.

But online courses do have recommended-reading lists, and enrollments in the tens of thousands. If even a small percentage of those online students buy books, the sales could add up to a nice boost for a textbook.

» via The Chronicle of Higher Education (Subscription may be required for some content)