If you're crediting MIT in your comment, then I feel your credit is misplaced. MIT is reacting to Stanford successfully completing a semester of a very similar initiative. MIT's initiative is incredibly generous, and looks awesome, but I think it's reactionary to Stanford's ___-class.org work.

'Reactionary' is a bit of a strong word. I think that this is an idea whose time has come and that both MIT and Stanford had these kinds of initiatives in the pipeline for a while. Stanford's success might have spurred MIT on a bit, but I'm sure they would have been on this path eventually anyway.

I just hope that other schools start moving in this direction and perhaps some standards or at least conventions start to take shape.

For example: it would be useful if there were tagged video classes and materials so that if I am confused by the presentation by one lecturer I could look up a lecture on the same topic by someone else. I find that seeing a topic from a slightly different perspective is enormously helpful.

This seems like a natural extension of MIT's OCW which has been going for 10 years now. It may be influenced by Stanford's recent clases, but "reactionary" is a bit of a stretch. MIT has been giving away free classes online for a long time, adding credentials seems like an obvious extension of that, and one that would have likely happened regardless of what Stanford does.

I agree. And I agree it seems like a natural extension, however it's not the idea that's impressive, the action itself is impressive. There are a lot of forces that make this step incredibly difficult for universities, hence why it has taken so long.

Naturally they have to be very cautious of how they market and execute on any alternative credentialing system, both due to the new system being in competition with the traditional, and to ensure the branding will (or can) not tarnish their name.