The LMS industry will survive into the future but it will be re-inventing itself continually. Comparing it to the music industry offers valuable lessons and cautionary tales. Thirty years ago, no one would have predicted the downfall of the big recording labels and the media machine that supported the production, sales and marketing of music world-wide. The industry enjoyed complete control because it was based on the delivery of tangible music vessels, like LP’s, cassettes and later CD’s. When the music went digital and sharable, the industry moguls lost their control. In the process, the public have been exposed to a much wider variety and choice of music, as well as different means to enjoy it.
The LMS industry will survive for two main reasons: they have the benefit of learning from the experiences of industries like music, and they have degree granting institutions as partners, who use them to maintain their own control. The value added to personalized learning through skills and knowledge gained informally and through MOOCs will continue to grow, but will represent a means of learning that will eventually be assessed by universities as being degree worthy or not. Ultimately, an institution determines how to grant credit it bestows with its letters, so there will always be a need to aggregate and coordinate the data that gives it that power. The most effective way of doing that will no doubt always be some form of LMS. The music industry was vulnerable because anyone could make music and seek it out in whatever form they choose. Ultimately, they could not control distribution. Universities cannot control the distribution of knowledge, but they do control the accreditation of their students. LMS are safe.
I predict that universities will be pivotal in the morphing of LMS design over time because they will refuse to pay for functionalities that are free and done better on the web. The companies are driven to keep pace with new developments and innovation like self-marking tests and grammar checking, but if users do not use them, institutions will refuse to pay. Our school has a Turnitin licence. Each year it introduces more functions that move it into the LMS market and the cost increases accordingly. I know that this will be our last year because the new admin will not support it.
Finally, Spiro’s rationale for the fall of LMS is questionable in a number of ways. He assumes that all students prefer self-directed learning. I would argue that the majority of undergraduates are at best managing a busy time in their lives. If they are hoop-jumping, they are probably not interested personalizing their learning. His notions on curation assume a frame of reference where the learner has some previous experience with the “human factor” that they would like to defer back to. It is more likely that student will select niche courses with a nostalgic face-to-face design to meet these needs. The reality of anytime-anywhere learning is probably overstated. This assumes that students are able to access their devices at other times of the day for educational purposes. Employers may not be so keen on this. More realistically, people will opt for catching-up on social media and browsing their feeds rather than taking a moment to check their MOOC. Larger parcels of time are necessary for that.
