From KCRW in Santa Monica and PRI, Public Radio International, this is To the Point.

Can higher education be democratized on the internet?

Hello again, I'm Orman Alney, and this is an archived edition of To the Point from Public Radio International, a daily look at the issues Americans care about most.

Stanford, Harvard, and other prestigious schools are reaching millions of students worldwide with massive open online courses or MOOCs.

And MOOCs are only a year old, leading divisions of a broader access to higher education at vastly reduced cost. Today we'll hear

what it's like to take a college course from a computer and what it's like to teach to a machine

instead of a classroom. Will MOOCs count for college credit? How long will they be offered for

free? On reporter's notebook later on, a new generation of leaders in both North and South Korea, will they make a difference?

First, here's the news.

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Hello again, Mormon Alney, back with To The Point.

If you've never heard of a MOOC, don't worry.

Massive, open, online courses are only a year old, but Stanford, Harvard, and other

prestigious schools are now using them to reach millions of students worldwide. We'll hear

about the benefits and the limits of higher education on the internet. On reporter's notebook,

North Korea's leader is the third generation of a family of dictators. South Korea's

newly elected president is the

daughter of that country's last autocrat. How will they get along? First this news update. In Greece,

...