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 CHAPTER 8

Everything is post these days, as if we're all just a footnote to something earlier that was real enough to have a name of its own. —

While setting out the manner in which openness has been ­successful, this book has thus far presented it as a largely beneficial approach. While it does have many benefits, there are also problems and issues associated with an open approach. One of the consequences of many of the open education developments being conducted in an adversarial manner, with commercial interests such as publishers either resisting it or others attempting to claim it, is that advocates of open education often feel they are forced to ignore any potential issues, lest they are seized upon to discredit the whole approach. This may be analogous to climate change scientists who have been reluctant to voice concerns about specific pieces of data or interpretations, because any doubts will be used to undermine the overall message.

This is yet another consequence of there being a battle for ­openness. As with the disruption myth we saw in Chapter 6, it forces people