The problem with using Facebook as an LMS
Statistics show that 800 million people are on Facebook. Fifty-percent of those users visit the site more than once a day. As a user myself that makes up that fifty-percent, it makes sense for one to ask why not combine eLearning with Facebook. If you’re new to eLearning or Facebook and think this is a brilliant new idea, do not be fooled. This idea of using Facebook as an LMS is not a new idea, in fact it has been a point of discussion in the past two to three years amongst the thought leaders of our industry. Although this idea of combining the two concepts would be of great assistance to charities and non-profits, purely due to cost; charities and non-profits should still be aware of things that Facebook could not offer compared to your custom LMS.
The most important question charities should ask is how secure would their data be in Facebook? We are all aware as Facebook users that once our data is in their system they own it. People are concerned about their privacy knowing that the CIA and US government have connections to Facebook and their data-mining of status updates and other profile information. Thus, using a custom LMS, like Litmos, charities and non-profits could sleep at night knowing that our system secures your content and data reporting.
In addition, charities should question reporting capabilities. At Litmos, we are frequently asked by our clients on how they can run reports on their learners. When using an LMS, clients want to be able to record learner interaction information, and then store that reporting data for compliance reasons. Unfortunately, Facebook does not have this feature. Although it could create this feature in the future if it were to integrate an LMS in their system, I’d still be concerned about the security issue and all the custom feature that an LMS offers.
And if a charity or non-profit is indecisive on which route to choose due to funds, they would find in their research that Litmos offers huge discounts on our regular pricing plans to not-for-profit organizations and charities. So please do not hesitate and send us an email if you would like to know more!
