Homework Help from Bangalore

A new private venture is working to increase America’s educational edge—from Bangalore. Using a website called TutorVista, students can connect with tutors in India who will help them learn the basics of math, science, and even English, plus SAT tests. The service costs less than a tenth of the going rate for in-person after-school help.

More and more of the best college lectures are freely available for viewing over the Internet. Recent initiatives at UC Berkeley and Yale have posted content covering everything from bio-engineering to business. A portal called University Channel, run by a former CNN producer, pulls together the best of what universities are sharing. The offerings include speeches by economic policy heavyweights like Ben Bernanke, Hank Paulson, and Allan Hubbard.

Reuters has broken new ground—virtually. In October, the agency named reporter Adam Pasick as chief of its first virtual bureau. The bureau is located in a simulated online world called Second Life, which has over a million users and a currency that trades against the dollar. Users sitting at their computers control “avatars”—virtual selves—that move around the Second Life environment. Users retain real-world copyright in the virtual houses, clothes, and other intellectual property they create, and some even make a living from the money they earn in the game.

So far, the news out of Second Life has consisted largely of interviews with virtual celebrities. But that’s changing as more companies—including Toyota, IBM, and American Apparel—grow virtual versions of their offline businesses inside the game. One recent story: the Australian government has decided that income earned in virtual worlds generates a real, old-fashioned tax liability.

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