I liked your article and it made me think of a number additional reports that could back up a lot of what you propose but might suggest different outcomes. In case interesting: There was an interesting UNESCO report out in summer 2023 that suggested (in my reading, you can read here: https://gem-report-2023.unesco.org/?source=post_page-----5d063b44990d--------------------------------) online educational platforms were more about expanding the brand than crafting real institutional change Musa Al-Gharbi expands a lot on this idea and its various shape over time in his most recent work on elite vs. egalitarian shifts in economic systems and the knowledge class: https://press.princeton.edu/books/hardcover/9780691232607/we-have-never-been-woke?srsltid=AfmBOorgpLAxVxoKWzr8WWP0-w7pK-jDEFdWr3UPgK0_qDO-TRmCT6wD. I found his work really accessible, and I'm not at all a specialist in this area. He notes elite universities and their adherents want to appear inclusive without necessarily becoming egalitarian as that would diminish their economic capacities within the existing system, and that tension is very present today as it has been at similar times in the past. As you note, elite universities function a bit like clubs ensuring well-paid jobs in important networks. Bitchy's June Kirri wrote an article looking at who gets to study and work in journalism, and it is generally individuals from specific socioeconomic backgrounds with access to relevant networks: https://medium.com/@junekirri/nyu-offers-an-online-graduate-degree-in-journalism-i-cant-afford-it-c3fd4030b5c3. I had a Nigerian colleague who has actively acquired skills via MOOCs who agreed: access to the skills is not the issue. We can learn what is needed if we have access to the Internet (not always a given and what we 'need' to know is different from what we are 'paid' to know, see deBoer's 'The Cult of Smart': https://us.macmillan.com/books/9781250224491/thecultofsmart/.) Access to the network, however, is essential if the skills possessed are to be well-remunerated, and this is a sticky point in times of high socioeconomic inequality. What we value is different from what is economically necessary in our given system, and there is a very human need to make it make sense even if the very construction of such a link is simply a rationalisation of one's current experience of today's reality.