e-LEARNING PROVIDERS NOT PROFITABLE YET-BUT GETTING CLOSER - Despite
predictions last year from the three leading eLearning software companies that they would be
profitable this year, none of them are there yet. Blackboard, Inc. has revised its goal for
profitability from the middle of this year to sometime before the end of the year. The company's
chairman said they are "sort of tantalizingly close." The chairman of eCollege said his firm
hopes to be profitable by the middle of next year. Top officials at WebCT said they are still on
target to be profitable this year, though they would not offer more specifics. Analysts said the
higher education market does not offer much room for further expansion, so companies must
either eliminate competition or venture into other areas, such as corporate training, if they are to
achieve profitability. Visit: http://chronicle.com/free/2002/05/2002052301u.htm (Chronicle of
Higher Education, 23 May 02 - Edupage, 24 May 02)

eLearning STANDARDS SUPPORTED BY MILITARY PROJECT - A recently created
set of standards for eLearning developed by the Department of Defense, allows applications and
content from a variety of vendors to work together. The Advanced Distributed Learning (ADL)
project, begun in 1997, was developed to eliminate having to create all new content whenever a
chip or part of a system changed. Many leaders in the eLearning market support this new set
of unofficial standards. Elliot Masie, president of a NY-based think tank and a project consultant
said that the effort has brought comprehensive standards to the eLearning industry years sooner
than would have otherwise happened. See:
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A11555-2002May13.html (Washington Post,
14 May 02)