Pearson's recent announcement of its 'Plug & Play' service has been discussed in various places on the net (including this very site) in usually glowing terms. The talk is all of 'setting content free' and 'embracing open source'. But I think that misses the point.

What Pearson have created with Plug & Play is certainly very useful and practical. It has the potential to widen the range of sites and services that can use Pearson's content, and hence increase the audience that Pearson can reach.

But it's not open, and it's not free.

What Pearson has done is difficult. They've created a way for developers to tap into their vast library of content (or, at least, a subset of that which Pearson chooses to make available) and pull that content into their own websites and other digital products. And doing this safely and securely has doubtless taken a lot of investment on their part. This is a Good Thing to have done.

But they are not doing it altrustically, or because of a belief in free content. Although developers will be able to access the content without paying, there are strict limits to how much they'll be able to share before having to pay. Exactly what those limits are don't seem to be clear yet, but it's also worth noting that developers must pre-pay for access. In other words, the payment model is very similar to the current permissions clearance model we're all already familiar with - predict how much usage you'll need and pay up front, then pay again once you exceed those limits.

What Pearson have done (and this is hardly a surprise) is to build what they hope will be a new revenue stream for them. They may be right - with assets from FT Press, Longman and DK already available, and others doubtless on their way, that's a rich source of content that developers will probably not be slow to exploit.

But the success of the effort will really depend on how free Pearson are really willing to be with their data. Developers will be rightly cautious about building sites or apps that rely on this data when they have to pay before use for it.