MOOCs presage a period of great change in higher education, but they will not kill off the traditional degree. After all, people still want to buy vinyl records in an era of MP3s. And so far there are insufficient numbers of graduates to force big shifts immediately. But MOOCs will prompt more rapid innovation in a sector facing enormous pressures over the cost of its basic product. Eventually the full-time residential four-year degree (three in Europe) could start to look out-of-date. Online education allows colleges to innovate with regard to the quality, length and cost of their offerings. It should be possible to offer shorter and cut-price degrees that are demonstrably equivalent (in terms of employability) to the degrees of today. Already there is pressure on publicly funded universities to accept online credits, and the American Council on Education says that it will evaluate MOOCs for college credit.
http://www.economist.com/blogs/economist-explains/2013/10/economist-explains