Taylor's “Open Courseware University” is a spin on the longstanding model of separating instruction from evaluation. Students in many countries can already prepare for credit-bearing examinations from the University of London External Programme and the like by learning the material at third party tutorial colleges. OERs could fit into such a system in many ways, such as through a consortium of tutorial colleges who would like to lower the costs of curriculum development through that sort of cooperation.
The issue that raises is that of the role of the private sector. Much of the growth of open source software has come from private companies that release their software openly to build a user base and to get attention, with a revenue model of selling ancillary services such as technical support and customization. Similarly, there's room for proprietary institutions of higher education to develop OERs, especially institutions that understand the difference between instruction and evaluation and have a revenue model based primarily on the latter.
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