Usability Views Article Details  home | timeline | recent | popular | e-reports | userati | books | about  Is learning just a game? The teachers' view (12 Jun 2002) On the games industry side, despite cautious interest in education software, developers harbour doubts about whether schools will provide a market to match burgeoning revenues from pure entertainment. Ironically, their reservations mirror those of front-line teachers: will schools be able to afford copies of software that might cost millions to develop? Peter Radley, leading light in the Broadband Stakeholder Group and former Alcatel UK Chairman, sought a middle-ground, asking whether interactive games platforms could be adapted to deliver classes in, say, spoken French. One developer said privately that the interest of games companies had not yet gone far beyond "repurposing" older titles. They hope to establish new revenue streams from finished development work, at a low marginal cost. Yet these difficulties may reflect the birth pangs, not the future. A recent report argues that the big educational publishers have been tardy to invest in content and services on the web. Once the potential market is in place, they could well adopt techniques derived from games software, encouraging games developers themselves to venture into the territory. Article URL: http://www.nestafuturelab.org/viewpoint/learn02.htm Read 76 more articles from NESTA Futurelab sorted by date, popularity, or title. Next Article: Steve Krug sets the Record Straight     This site is a labour of love built by Chris McEvoy