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Originally Posted by soondai
Yeah, the Great Courses can be hit or miss, but are sure hard to beat for bang-for-the buck. Some of them run 36 hours for one credit.
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I didn't think about the credit aspect, but it's probably because I'm not a credit member and rarely have been one in the past.
Quote:
Originally Posted by soondai
They've recently been cropping up in a lot of services available in libraries. Overdrive, RB digital, Hoopla, and Kanopy all carry a selection in either audio or video formats.
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I haven't noticed that, but I haven't been checking, either. I got so ticked off with the "improvements" that FreeGal made recently, that I've gotten disgusted with the whole digital thing through libraries, and haven't checked, recently, either of the library systems with which I have privileges.
It seems that libraries have traditionally favored Recorded Books over other lecture-type recordings. They might cheaper for libraries to acquire, I dunno. RB audios are good, and I've bought quite a few of them, too, but I think that the lecturers are not quite up to the level of TGC's. On the other hand, Recorded Books has audio on subjects that TGC doesn't seem to cover.
Quote:
Originally Posted by soondai
Dunno what the future hold for the company. Seems pretty tough to make it against all the free podcasts and moocs, but I hope they can find a way to stick around. Their streaming service seems pretty desperate for customers. It started out pretty expensive, but can now be had for 10 bucks a month if you but in 3 month blocks. Their emails smack a bit of desperation, reminding me of some of the magazine offers I get in the mail.
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I think that their long-term prospects are good. Their typical sales (which, as you might have implied, are very often) still leave the price of the courses pretty high. I think that relatively few people are as price-conscious as most of us on this thread are, who I think that, for the most part, are willing to delay gratification until the price of something gets very low.
Your observation about the streaming service may be spot-on.
If you want more frequent communication from TGC, you can always sign up for their snail mail sales announcements. ha