HIGHER EDUCATION BUBBLE UPDATE: Higher Education’s Online Revolution: The substitution of technology (which is cheap) for labor (which is expensive) can vastly increase access to an elite-caliber education.

At the recent news conference announcing edX, a $60 million Harvard-MIT partnership in online education, university leaders spoke of reaching millions of new students in India, China and around the globe. They talked of the “revolutionary” potential of online learning, hailing it as the “single biggest change in education since the printing press.”

Heady talk indeed, but they are right. The nation, and the world, are in the early stages of a historic transformation in how students learn, teachers teach, and schools and school systems are organized.

If only someone, somewhere, would explain what’s going on in a short, easy-to-read book.