The lack of standards casts a long shadow on the e-learning and learning management systems market. Final LMS standards appear to be a year or two away, and until then there is no guarantee of any possible plug-and-play compatibility among systems. Content providers are slow to comply with budding standards because of costs. They providers have a lot of proprietary software development tools that were built at a time when standards didn't exist. They'll have to throw those away and start using industry-standard development tools. That will cost them money at a time when content profit margins already are fairly competitive. (2001-06-10)