The Amazon Effect | The Nation: “Bezos understood two things. One was the way the Internet made it possible to banish geography, enabling anyone with an Internet connection and a computer to browse a seemingly limitless universe of goods with a precision never previously known and then buy them directly from the comfort of their homes. The second was how the Internet allowed merchants to gather vast amounts of personal information on individual customers.”
Luckily for Bezos and Amazon, oxygen is not an element necessary for internet commerce. Otherwise, Amazon would have already consumed all of the gas necessary to breathe in this brave new world economy.
However, monopolies are problematic.
That is especially true in regard to book publishers, whose content is so vital to the concept of free republics such as the United States. So in a world of post-nationlist information trading, how do these concerns get handled?
Something that has been on my mind a great deal as we plot out the middle school science and math curriculum at Carolina Day for the coming years…
Computer Programming for All: A New Standard of Literacy: “300 years ago, Bishay said, ‘you would have to hire to write a letter for you, and hire them to read the letter for you. It is just insane.’ Today most people hire a skilled programmer to write computer programs for them.”
I’d say yes… but I’m a nerd/geek/dork.
Of course, I think everyone should be one of those three things.
Steve Jobs – One Last Thing : PBS: “Life can be much broader once you discover one simple fact, and that is, everything around you that you call life was made up by people that were no smarter than you … the minute that you understand that you can poke life … that you can change it, you can mould it … that’s maybe the most important thing.”
It took me 33 years to get this straight and I’m still working on it… I hope my students realize this sooner than I did in their own timelines.
Oddly enough, the business it has built itself upon is doom to fail much like the subscription business that AOL used to become the “Facebook” of its day.
Doc Searls takes apart Facebook and the advertising-as-personalization web with a fascinating piece…
Doc Searls Weblog · After Facebook fails: “The buyer is a person. That person does not require either a social network or absolutely-informed guesswork to know who he or she is or what they want to buy. Obviously advertising can help. It always has. But totally personalized advertising is icky and oxymoronic. And, after half a decade or more at the business of making maximally-personalized ads, the main result is what Michael calls ‘the desultory ticky-tacky kind that litters the right side of people’s Facebook profiles.’”
Facebook is a modern day marvel in the same way that Prodigy or Compuserve with their proprietary and non-communicative messaging systems and bulletin board infrastructures were in the mid 90′s. They collapsed at the hand of the open and federated web, and he same will happen to these modern closed systems no matter their perceived infallibility.
There’s something about makers and Indiana Jones (I don’t have the replica fedora but I did spend a ton of money on the exact bag):
MAKE | Adam Savage’s Maker Faire 2012 Talk: Why We Make: “Adam Savage’s talk at Maker Faire Bay Area 2012. Adam tells a great story about his Indiana Jones hat, how he got started building his obsessions, and why makers should embrace the things that they have no choice but to make.”
Makers love Han Solo and Indiana Jones and James Bond and old-school radio technology. We should not lose this part of our maker-sub-culture as we move ahead into the brave new digital world.
Nice resources and research guides for teachers and schools interested in converting to the PBL mindset…
Project-Based Learning: Success Start to Finish | Edutopia: “There is a small town, about 12 miles east of Austin, Texas, where a high school devoted to teaching every subject to every student through project-based learning (PBL) opened five years ago.”
Go watch the video.
[Update] My awesome vice-boss reprimanded me for not reading his blog before posting this (great minds think alike). So, here is Mr Douglas’ take on PBL and what we’re doing at Carolina Day.
While an engineering and production marvel to behold, this video causes me internal qualms as I hold my iPhone and type this on my iPad.
A Rare Video From Inside an iPhone Factory: “Gou says that the area around the factory, which he refers to as a wasteland, is being reserved for further expansion of the plant.”
The video is something out of a dystopic video so far removed from my world, culture and life that I find it hard to digest that my only connection to these 115,000 people are the shiny toys computing devices I have because of their work.
Two things I’m very passionate about are NASCAR and iPads. Being passionate about those necessarily means that I frequently encounter people who roll their eyes at NASCAR as a serious form of scientific/engineering enjoyment (rednecks turning left in 100 degree heat for 4 hours) and iPads being used for more than playing Jetpack Joyride.
However, I’m seeing more and more crew chiefs, car engineers and now race reporters turning to iPads during races…
How an iPad Speeds Reporting from NASCAR’s Pit Row – Mac Rumors: “When the iPad was released in 2010, Burns instantly saw the potential. He could digitize his notepads, drop the pen and paper, and carry all his reference material with him to every race. After addressing concerns about size; durability; using it outside in the bright summer sun; and, perhaps most importantly, which apps to use; Burns arrived at his perfect setup:”
Steve Burns is a quality pit reporter and has always impressed me with his ability to summarize something as complicated as a 14 second pit stop where tire pressures are adjusted, a certain amount of fuel is added, an adjustment to the suspension is made and the chassis is tweaked in just a few words on air in almost real time.
I’m also glad to see him using the awesome Note Taker HD to help process all that information.
NASCAR is more than just a silly group of grown men drinking beer and playing mario kart and iPads are not just for content consumption.
I’ve been working on something similar with PayPerTrends.
How Gawker wants to monetize comments | Felix Salmon: “Still, I do like the fact that Denton’s constantly trying new things, constantly trying to reinvent what an online media company can and should be. Really ambitious brands, indeed, won’t need Wert’s help at all: they’ll have the ability to dive straight into existing non-sponsored editorial posts and respond to commenters directly, much as they’re already responding to people who talk about them on Twitter.”
Diane Ravitch takes apart Joel Klein and Condoleezza Rice’s new report “US Education Reform and National Security” piece by piece and exposes it for the sham that it is…
Do Our Public Schools Threaten National Security? by Diane Ravitch | The New York Review of Books: “NCLB and Race to the Top have imposed on American education a dreary and punitive testing regime that would gladden the hearts of a Gradgrind but demoralizes the great majority of teachers, who would prefer the autonomy to challenge their students to think critically and creatively. This dull testing regime crushes the ingenuity, wit, playfulness, and imagination that our students and our society most urgently need to spur new inventions and new thinking in the future.”
What a terrible, misguided and harmful thing to publish.
My 7th grade students and I have been watching the video this morning and commenting on our shared experiences around cultural events:
It’s interesting to me that although we don’t have a Dan Rather or Tom Brokaw evening news experience shared throughout all facets of our “mainstream” (and outside the mainstream) North American culture, we have something like YouTube to still generate memetics, cultural phrases and shared experiences.
Beautiful presentation from NOVA on how artists in the medieval period produced such incredible works of dedication and science…
NOVA | Medieval Stained Glass Science: “How did craftsmen of the Middle Ages make stained glass windows using little more than sand, wood, and fire?”
We too frequently presume our own superiority because of the seeming advancement of technology. However, time is the least suitable indicator of progress.
Teaching is the most exhausting career imaginable but also the most rewarding.
So true:
No Quiet Time | Merianna Neely: “Most people outside of education do not know what it is like to look at the clock in the morning and hope that you get a chance to run to the bathroom before the bell rings, because if you don’t, you’re just not sure when you’ll make it there. But it’s ok, these are all the issues that come with being an educator and most of us accept it with a positive attitude because this is our chosen profession.”
I love what I do, but in reality I accept that the average civilian has no idea how many times I hear my name called on a daily basis and how tiring being a progressive teacher in the 21st century can be.
I’m ok with that (even when a parent comments to me about how great it must be to be a teacher so that I can spend more time with my two daughters in the afternoon and during “summers”).
Maybe teaching was a profession for “those who can’t” thirty, forty or fifty years ago but that has certainly changed for those of us who do keep up with brain science research, sociological studies of pre-teens and early teens and the rising tide of technological tools at our disposal.
I wouldn’t have it any other way.
Now, back to class. I just used my “free” period helping a 6th grader with a math problem, an 8th grader install dropbox on their Droid and another 8th grader making a strong conclusion to conclude her research on AIDS and the developing world.
I have the greatest job in the world. Quit your job and go teach.
Connecting via Social Media | Merianna Neely: “Or do we take a different route and talk about the personal benefits that we have found reading blogs that recount other people’s journeys toward self-awareness and fulfilled lives?”
