"As I have written earlier, the course I'll be running this month about "Academia and the MOOC" (for NJEDge using the Canvas Network) will probably have 500-1000 participants, so I don't consider it "massive." Others have felt the same about their offerings and the term BOOC, for a Big but not massive MOOC has been thrown into the mix.

And since my offering has very little of the traditional elements of a course - no tests, grades, assignments, or credit - I don't consider it to be a "course" as much as I consider it to be a conversation or colloquium.

Just last month, the University of Massachusetts - Boston launched a course using a new learning management system (Adaptive Mobile Online Learning) to deliver what they are calling the first aMOOC - an adaptive Massive Online Open Course.

So much attention has been on MOOC content, class sizes, and credentialing, that the technology that allows and delivers these courses is also important and is part of what differentiates these various MOOCs.

These early days of MOOCs are a bit confusing and the definition is sure to continue to evolve. I suspect the semantics of the MOOC is less important than the experiments and the idea that they will probably change not only how we do online learning, but also learning in all settings. And the part that probably scares some educators and institutions even more is that they may change the definitions of "courses," "credits" and "degrees."