Morrison [30 Sep 96] and others have made comments which seem, more than less, to highlight people problems as opposed to those related to technological systems. I especially liked the comments from the University of Western Sydney [Pennell, 30 Sep 96] which clearly highlighted some of the problems I suspect many of us have experienced.
I have a similar tale to tell, which may be found in a work Karen Murphy and I edited (An International Survey of Distance Education and Teacher Training: From Smoke Signals to Satellite II) which contains about 30+ articles--many of which are along the lines of Rob's questions posed.
In this work some of my students tell the tale of how a colleague and I tried mightily to launch a distance education course about distance education. We used every technology in the book and then some which had not been used (to our knowledge) before.
The essence of the chapter the students wrote describes their perceptions of the course, while the following chapter was my turn to reply.
Almost all of the students were unaware that anything unusual was taking place while they took the course, aside from the group who wrote the chapter I mentioned. They were intimately involved helping me to develop the course materials and saw the extreme frustration I faced in trying to match my style with that of a colleague (whose idea of preplanning was to get together the week prior and decide what was to be covered); with using a system which, at best, was held together with the proverbial band-aids and baling wire; with a support service who thought they were being generous in providing me with a producer/director and a grad assistant to launch the class--all of which was combined with my having to teach another course and supervise a dozen interns in the field.
Oh yes, this class went out via live satellite, two hours every week during the summer of '94.
It was not a pretty picture.
I could ramble on for days describing innumerable points Rob lists with sub-sets of points within points as well. Suffice to say, I was glad when my 80 hour weeks that summer ended.
Would I repeat the process? Yes, teach it alone but with better support services to back me up (being done as we speak, planning NOW for next summer's class). It was my stupidity for allowing myself to be brought into the dual instructor concept (but there are many instructors with whom I can and will easily collaborate!). What would have helped me most would have been the presence of a course manager to keep track of all the logistics, deadlines, production of graphics (thank God for PowerPoint back then!), etc., as well as line up talent, review video clips, etc.
The thing I found to be all-consuming was the need to communicate with me by the students via e-mail, each of which wanted immediate replies. I felt they deserved quick answers and always saw that they were provided--but at what cost!!!