Youtube becomes house of learning too

Youtube is no longer a place for entertainment alone. It has also become a house of learning with the University of California (UC), Berkeley, becoming the first one to make its entire course lectures and special events available, free of charge, on YouTube.

Visitors to the site at youtube.com/ucberkeley can view more than 300 hours of videotaped courses and events.

Topics range from bioengineering, to peace and conflict studies, to "Physics for Future Presidents", the title of a popular campus course. Building on its initial offerings, UC Berkeley will continue to expand the catalog of videos available on YouTube.

"UC Berkeley on YouTube will provide a public window into university life "" academics, events and athletics "" which will build on our rich tradition of open educational content for the larger community," said Christina Maslach, UC Berkeley's vice provost for undergraduate education.

YouTube is a leading online video community that allows people to discover, watch and share originally created videos. The video-sharing website allows people to easily upload and share video clips on youtube.com and across the Internet through websites, blogs and e-mail.

UC Berkeley has been a leader in the open-source video movement in higher education since fall 2001, when the campus' educational technology services (ETS) launched webcast.berkeley.edu "" a local site that delivers course and event content as podcasts and streaming video.

In April 2006, UC Berkeley launched its audio podcast programme, making audio content available as free downloads through webcast.berkeley.

On pace to deliver 86 full courses and more than 100 events, amounting to more than 3,500 hours of content in 2007, the programme has expanded dramatically since delivering 15 courses in its inaugural year.

"YouTube's ongoing innovations create a great environment in which students and lifelong learners alike can discover, watch and share educational videos," said Ben Hubbard, ETS co-manager of webcast.berkeley.

"We are excited to make UC Berkeley videos available to the world on YouTube and will continue to expand our offerings."