OMG the OS is the Internet
OK – the iPad is amazing. I can totally justify it as an information consuming device. But I’m in Higher Education so it needs to be somewhat of a creation device and flexible sharing device. Initially I was stuck in the my old file based operating system box. How do a print? How do I upload an assignment to Moodle? How do I save my work?
I woke up at 4:00 am – OMG – the operating system is the Internet. http://www.iwork.com is one of the most well thought out web file sharing platforms I have ever used. I was trying to figure out how I was going to upload a file to our Web storage service based on Xythos. No – now I realize Xythos has to figure out how to let me upload from an URL rather then assuming it is coming from the old file system based OS. The URL is now truly the file. This is just an example for interacting with the current file based OS world. You really do have incredible sharing and interaction with the iPad Internet based operating system.
Here is a document produced on Pages by my recent college graduated daughter minutes after she touched the iPad for the first time. I intentionally let her first try it with the wireless keyboard.
http://public.iwork.com/document/?a=p147015419&d=IPad_Pages_Doc.pages
Here is a presentation created by same daughter shortly there after, first time she had ever used Keynote and done entirely on iPad in a half hour.
http://public.iwork.com/document/?a=p147015419&d=IPad_Presentation.key
Disclosure: I do not know why my daughter immediately gravitated to these two tests. She is not tech savvy and the rest of her iPad time she was on FaceBook not realizing that there are some Flash limitations via the browser. I do thank her for how she helped me understand this though.
Email is the communicator which is a natural, that initially bothered me since email tends to carry a bad taste due to years of misuse. But this iWork.com tool is a good solution and I’m sure it will evolve. We will probably see options for easily integrating this into Google Apps, etc. But the playing field is clear and it is and it is the Internet. And yes the optimal environment is an iPhone for total mobility, an iPad for primary consuming device and the Mac for creation and master organization. And yes this is expensive and probably considered unnecessarily extravagant. And that is true. I guess I equate it to why some people shop at Saks when you can get almost the same products at KMart. And you know what, you can’t justify it, but consider who shops at Saks and who do you really want to be?
OK – Good Night and Happy Easter
We will offer the iPad as a choice for our laptop program
If you have followed my blog or George Fox University you know about our laptop program where in recent years we have given out an Apple MacBook to all incoming freshman. The purpose for the program was for marketing, standardization and convenience. The issue for us is the changing landscape of educational computing and the value dilution of a laptop for a traditional undergraduate. George Fox University happens to find itself at the crossroads for both of these issues.
We had been hoping that the iPad would be the perfect transition technology, but I address some of the shortcomings of the iPad that prevented us from offering the iPad in place of the MacBook next year. However, in looking for a way to offer an option to the MacBook we have decided to offer the iPad as an alternative choice. I think this will be a very interesting opportunity that will first be marked by the percentage who select the iPad and second by the success we find in utilizing and supporting it. Now we will make sure the iPad offering is as complete as possible and we won’t be able to give any guarantees that the iPad equally replaces the MacBook. In fact the smarter value choice would be for the MacBook, but what will the students choose?
There will be many reasons why students may choose an iPad and it will typically break down into those who already have their laptop of choice or those who actually believe that the iPad is the more functional computing device for them to be a successful student. How the numbers work out will be interesting, but no matter what I think we will see many iPads, iPhones and iTouches throughout the undergraduate population. We will be deliberate in tying to integrate these mobile devices into our Teaching & Learning strategies, but in most cases we will just be observing whether the iPad satisfies the technology needs for undergraduate higher education. Of course the rapid availability and our adoption of E-Textbooks will strongly influence the value of the iPad. Stay tuned.
Writing, Printing & Publishing has Changed
Document format has always been a key to control of software selection and retention. That dominance not only guaranteed Microsoft’s control of the Office Suite market but also allowed them to create a renewable market with manipulation of their format. We in tech support were forced to upgrade our MS Office Suite in order to eliminate the user hassles with their inability to open the new formats. But what about all of those great new features in MS Word that allowed us to be so much more effective writers.
The point of my post – communication has changed. Those impressive writing features in programs like MS Word are more in the way now. 20 years ago we communicated by means of a printed document, 10 years ago printed format was still important. But how many printed documents do you create today? We write for electronic distribution today and that medium handles the format for us. Benefits of MS Word have allowed for more elegant authoring in Outlook, but again, the trend is obvious. It reminds me of the advice offered in Paul McDougall’s InformationWeek article: “7 Things Microsoft Must Do in 2010”. Cut the price of Windows and free Office. I actually thought of this post while reading about competition between Apple and Google. Competition based on the relevant tech business market that Microsoft is not a part of. And I realized that Apple’s publishing tools such as iLife and iWork and even Google Apps are so much more relevant to this electronic publishing era, price is right as well.
Did an Angel influence Blackboard?
In Blackboard’s press release on December 15th, 2009: Blackboard, Desire2Learn Announce Patent Cross License Agreement and Settlement of Litigation.
“We are pleased to have resolved our differences with Desire2Learn,” said Michael Chasen, President and CEO of Blackboard. “Bringing this matter to resolution is in the best interests of both of our organizations, our respective clients and the broader education community.”
Congratulations, it appears that level heads have prevailed and maybe we can assume Blackboard’s Chief B & L, Matthew H. Small, is no longer calling all the shots. I do hope that all players are able to return to a focus on serving their customers. An Angel must have intervened.
Streaming Your Athletic Events is a Win
I happen to be a CIO who is also a sports fan and supporting my university’s athletic programs is a benefit of the job. IT’s involvement with Athletics in recent years has been based on the technology needed for broadcasting our sporting events. A good partnership as IT needed to perfect video streaming techniques and Athletics was looking for any exposure they could get. Early on we had excess bandwidth to offer up for video streaming of events. Last year we learned a lot about streaming and video production, etc. Some success and failures, but it was a lot of fun and with parents of the athletes the primary benefactors.
Well we got some exposure mostly with having a NCAA Women’s Basketball Championship, so there was increased demand for improved digital presence for Athletics. We solved a big need by outsourcing our Athletics website, but improving the video streaming was the big problem. The issue for streaming had to due with my lack of excess bandwidth (read my last blog post). We outsourced our athletics website to Presto so I inquired about their involvement with video streaming. They pointed me to Stretch Internet, which has provided us with a very acceptable and improved solution. Now we are having more fun improving our video production quality. We’re granting internships to students in our Cinema and Media Communications program, selling sponsorships to pay for the broadcasts and seeing early viewer numbers that are telling us this is good for exposure. Something tells me we have again set the bar up a notch and I think this will provide positive support for our university.
Entertainent On Demand is in Command
A year ago we had excess Internet bandwidth for our traditional campus of 1700 undergraduates. But since the beginning of fall semester we have seen this bandwidth rapidly be consumed. For a few years now we have been predicting that increased access to video would become a problem. And it has contributed, in the form of real-time “experience now” applications. This real–time entertainment traffic (streaming audio & video, peercasting, place-shifting, flash video) has jumped from 12.6 to 26.6 % of Internet traffic since last year (Sandvine). But it is not necessarily just the YouTube effect, which does account for 5% of all Internet traffic. And for our university it is not influenced by the predominate percentage of Internet pornography thanks to filtering. No, the problem for us is the improved access to Internet TV and the growth of online entertainment through gaming consoles.
We don’t have cable TV for our students, there was never a huge demand for it. But with this age of TV & movies on demand, our students are definitely investing more of their time for Internet entertainment. The Sandvine report identifies that mature broadband markets have embraced on-demand entertainment while emerging markets still rely on P2P. College students are mature broadband users who are taking advantage of the much improved on demand entertainment delivery systems being deployed by the TV networks, Netflix, Hulu and Boxee. Of course I’m sure they are also devouring the PBS and National Geographic videos.
What is surprising is how quickly the demand has been increasing and I think that is due to a new commitment from the entertainment providers. They have finally embraced the Internet model with more sophisticated buffered players that provide acceptable quality even on a congested Internet. The battle is definitely on with the TV networks. Check them out, I would give ABC and Fox the lead and I would guess that the Hulu concept will be happy with a secondary role. The advertisers are shifting to Internet entertainment as well. So good luck Cable, maybe it is finally time for a new model of cable channel on demand.
Sandvine Report: On-Demand Is In Demand
Internet traffic report identifies real-time applications as key driver in consumer data consumption
30 Years Since Visicalc
This week marks the 30 year anniversary for the release of Visicalc, the software application that launched the micro-computer industry. Maybe most remembered for the fact that the author’s never patented visicalc and saw the idea turned into a fortune by Lotus 123. The first true Open Source release unfortunately ahead of its time.
Don’t Worry, Be Happy
Time for my post on the current state of Learning Management Systems, LMS, or my take on Blackboard buying Angel Learning. I do not believe that the purchase of Angel by BB is in any way good, especially for the poor Angel customers. I love the argument that the greater resources of BB will be beneficial to Angel, LOL. The bottom line is that the economic model of the commercial LMS vendors can only work if the customers continue to be willing slaves to the commercial dictator. And they are because of the greater pain that would be required to ask faculty to learn a new system. I believe that BB customers still do not own the software and if they do not renew the contract they must show proof that they are no longer using it. That is ridiculous and always has been. Academic institutions should be ashamed to have allowed this type of lease agreement to persist over the years. The lease arrangement is the core of the problem. LMS software is not sophisticated, I know, I watched my own student worker create 2 significant LMS products. Why can’t you buy the software and pay a typical 18% maintenance fee? Because it is not even worth the 18%. If you have an open mind there is no question that Sakai or Moodle is essentially equivalent to BB and they probably get better support because the huge user community is allowed access to the code.
BlackBoard has a large revenue appetite that it will find to be more and more difficult to quench as more customers break free of the chains. So how do you think BB will manage that appetite? Who do you think will get fed?
Could our Mobile Device be the Key to our Privacy?
I was contemplating the possibilities for how our mobile computing devices could serve as forms of identity. It is an electronic device that we control, that could offer personal validation; it could provide proximity authorization via various transmission modes; it is a repository that can be used to provide any type of information about us, etc, etc. So what are some possibilities for managing our identity information on our mobile device? There are some personal health record apps for the iPhone and of course numerous personal financial apps. What about our ultimate personal identity?
What if our personal mobile computing device served as an access control key to our genetic map, our personal genome? I bring this up because back in 2003 when I was finishing up my MS in Bioinformatics I designed the schema for a National Health Database. The concept worked from a National ID as a starting point for accessing or referencing all data that would be important for a personal health record. The ultimate challenge that I did not have a real answer for was the access control needed for the highest security, our personal genetic map, our DNA code. The design was based on this data being encrypted from inception with access based on a personal digital key that could be used to activate de-encryption when used in conjunction with an authorized medical professional’s digital key. At the time I could only imagine some sort of smartcard or embedded chip, but I was hung up on communication. I kind of saw it as 2 people with keys needed to launch a nuclear missile. But now I think it may be possible to design a scheme that works from a mobile computing device that might allow us to build this National Health Database. The mobile device is key for its ability to allow the patient to authorize access to their medical information with remote flexibility. Biometrics will probably be involved, but could a mobile device provide a privacy solution?
By the way, my thesis was titled “Security of Our Personal Genome”.
The Adventure Continues 