So I read Will’s post and the +30 comments, and then I read your post, and now I’m asking myself, what was the question again?

Do universities have a role? Yes; especially in furthering research, but less so, IMO, in preparation for work life, which is where many have focused their efforts since the post-secondary boom ($$) of the 1960’s. PhD’s for research make sense. BA’s for work preparation don’t make sense, and they were never designed as work preparation anyway. It just came about, for several reasons, that if you had a degree you got a better job. Now that we’re saturated with degrees, the value of a degree has dropped. For example, Canada has the highest rate of post-secondary credentials in the world, but our politicians and business leaders are constantly complaining about our productivity gap with the US. But, I digress …

My main point was that universities “own” the credentials game and the university is taking advantage of its market position. In applied areas, such as social computing, going to school and getting a degree may not be the best way to master the field. Unfortunately, the market is skewed in favour of universities. I think that this might change.

To answer the question as to whether a university should offer a degree in social computing, my answer would be, yes, if it wants to. However, I don’t believe that a degree is the only way that a person can show mastery. Even the courts are recognizing that there is more than one way to exhibit competence in a field, as an Ontario Superior Court clearly told the Ontario College of Teachers.

BTW, you’ve changed to a much more spartan looking website 😉