In order to match (and perhaps exceed) the customary strengths of the still dominant face-to-face instructional mode, a high-performance online learning system must employ synchronous as well as asynchronous communications; buttress graphics, animation, and text with live audio and video; and provide many of the features and processes associated with course management systems. What we here call Web conferencing systems (or "Webcons") address these needs and are gradually becoming more readily available since their rise in the mid-1990s. Improved bandwidth management is enabling access for dial-up users and for the increasing number of people with cable modems and DSL lines at home and T1 or better lines at work. And competition between such vendors as Centra, Elluminate, Horizon Wimba, Interwise, Live Meeting, Macromedia Breeze, and WebEx is driving down costs on systems that provide advanced features such as • live, multipoint video from the desktop of any participant; • high-quality, duplex audio operating in parallel with text chat; • recording and repurposing of content in high-quality compressed files; • storage and retrieval of multimedia course materials; • multiple simultaneous online sessions; • ad-hoc and formal session scheduling integrated with contact systems like Microsoft Outlook; • breakout sessions; an
