Google

Paul Hudson, author of Prelude to Tomorrow, was kind enough to speak to me and my summer reading workshop about his book at the beginning of the year. Two weeks ago he did a similar talk at Google.

It is a great book, if you have the time, I highly recommend reading it. Watch the video and judge for yourself.

If you teach World History, you need to check out the new Google Earth 3D layer of Ancient Rome. It presents Rome as it would have looked in 320 AD.

The layer was created by Google and The Rome Reborn project at The University of Virginia.

In addition, Google for Educators have created a competition that is connected to the release of the new Ancient Rome layer. Create interesting lessons based upon the new Rome layer and win some great prizes.

This post is for my workshop on Chris Anderson’s book The Long Tail.

The Long Tail

From An employee at Amazon when talking about the Long Tail:

“We sold more books today that didn’t sell at all yesterday than we sold today of all the books that did sell yesterday.”

What does this statement represent?

The Response

The Rise and Fall of the Hit

If the Long Tail killed the Hit and made commodities more widely available, will physical stores survive?

Shelf Space Strategies in Long Tail Markets

The Future

Because of the Internet and the minimal cost of online storage, more and more stuff is not available to a wider and wider audience. Anderson’s thesis in The Long Tail is a groundbreaking one. But his new book, Free will have even great implications.

Introduction to Free on YouTube.

So if the Long Tail Destroyed the idea of the 80-20 rule (that is 20% of a companies products make up 80% of its revenue) what will this concept of free economics do to the future of the marketplace?

Google

Nick Carr sums up Google’s economic model like this:

“Google’s protean appearance is not a reflection of its core business. Rather, it stems from the vast number of complements to its core business. Complements are, to put it simply, any products or services that tend be consumed together. Think hot dogs and mustard, or houses and mortgages. For Google, literally everything that happens on the Internet is a complement to its main business. The more things that people and companies do online, the more ads they see and the more money Google makes. In addition, as Internet activity increases, Google collects more data on consumers’ needs and behavior and can tailor its ads more precisely, strengthening its competitive advantage and further increasing its income. As more and more products and services are delivered digitally over computer networks — entertainment, news, software programs, financial transactions — Google’s range of complements expands into ever more industry sectors. That’s why cute little Google has morphed into The Omnigoogle.

Because the sales of complementary products rise in tandem, a company has a strong strategic interest in reducing the cost and expanding the availability of the complements to its core product. It’s not too much of an exaggeration to say that a company would like all complements to be given away. If hot dogs became freebies, mustard sales would skyrocket. It’s this natural drive to reduce the cost of complements that, more than anything else, explains Google’s strategy. Nearly everything the company does, including building big data centers, buying optical fiber, promoting free Wi-Fi access, fighting copyright restrictions, supporting open source software, launching browsers and satellites, and giving away all sorts of Web services and data, is aimed at reducing the cost and expanding the scope of Internet use. Google wants information to be free because as the cost of information falls it makes more money.

There’s one more twist. Because the marginal cost of producing and distributing a new copy of a purely digital product is close to zero, Google not only has the desire to give away informational products; it has the economic leeway to actually do it. Those two facts — the vast breadth of Google’s complements, and the company’s ability to push the price of those complements toward zero — are what really set the company apart from other firms. Google faces far less risk in product development than the usual business does. It routinely introduces half-finished products and services as online “betas” because it knows that, even if the offerings fail to win a big share of the market, they will still tend to produce attractive returns by generating advertising revenue and producing valuable data on customer behavior. For most companies, a failed launch of a new product is very costly. For Google, in general, it’s not. Failure is cheap.”

How will Google’s business model shift our perspective towards the future of economics?

Clay Shirky

Failure is cheaper… The average quality of what is produced is much lower but the average quality of what is consumed is much higher.

What is the implication of this change? How will it impact the future of economics?

Shirky’s new book is Here Comes Everybody and he has blog as well.

For more information on the Long Tail and the principles that Chris Anderson discussed, visit his blog.

Lately I’ve been thinking a lot about how we make our daily work as seamless and manageable as possible no matter our location. One of the major problems that I have noticed as an educator is having my information located all over the place.  Another issue I see school’s having is dependence upon infrastructure.

These problems can be solved with a solution like cloud computing. Because the applications and storage would be located online, a school could minimize its dependence upon hardware and licenses, cutting costs and centralizing access to applications and information. Cloud computing has the potential to bring laptops to more students as all you would need is a web browser and an internet connection to access everything from email to word processors.

Applications like Google Apps have the potential to simplify our lives by bringing all we need into one location. If we are to make technology a ubiquitous part of our lives, we have to make it manageable. The ability to have all of our applications n one location that is accessible on any computer with an internet connection will do that. Not only will it simplify our lives but it will allow us to go beyond the classroom computer and access our information anywhere.

photo credit: Creativity+Timothy K Hamilton

If you like the potential of virtual worlds for educational purposes but are afraid of the openness/shadyness of Second Life there is now Lively, which was created by Google. It is a program that you can download on to your computer. You control who has access to the virtual community you create.

The ability to create a virtual conference room that you design yourself without the fear of access from strangers should calm the fears of many educators when examining the use of virtual worlds. Lively has a lot of potential to bridge the gap for distance learning and could be a great “flattening” tool. I can’t wait to check it out when they come out with a Mac version. This has the potential to do a great deal of good for distance learning and helping classrooms connect with schools from around the world, spreading cultures and ideas.

At this point in time Lively is only available for Windows.

Check out the promotional video that was produced by Google:

If you have never seen Google Trends, it tracks the searches made on Google’s web search. Google Trends can help us understand our culture. The website tracks what is of interest. There are two facets to this site: Google Trends and Hot Trends.

Google Trends

Google Trends can be an excellent way to examine how events that happened in different parts of the world can be examined. For instance take a search of Aristotle and Confucius. Google Trends will present how often the chosen terms have been searched and where they were searched. When discussing perspective, Google Trends could prove useful. As you can see in the picture below, Aristotle many more searches than Confucius. Does this make Confucius any less of a philosopher? What about the location of the searches?

Does it mean anything that even in the Philippines we find Aristotle to be searched higher than Confucius. This type of tool can be used to start discussions on point of view and perspective. While the search volume on Confucius is not as high, the news reference is almost equal at some points. Why is this? These are questions that Google Trends can help raise. It can be an interesting way to get your students to examine more deeply the questions of why the Western education and influence still has a strong grip on the world despite the effects of globalization.

Hot Trends

Hot Trends is a way to quickly take a look at what people are interested in. The page provides you with the top 100 searches of that particular day. For instance, today many people were searching the results of the Neil Entwistle trial.

The Hot Trends section gives the view a intimate look into what people in the United States or around the globe are searching. This is an excellent way to examine pop culture and discuss our culture and what influences our interests.

Last week I posted two articles, one by Nicholas Carr of the Atlantic and one by the Economist. Both took a stance on technology and it’s impact upon our society. I wanted to discuss their arguments and present my own opinion.

The Atlantic

Nicholas Carr argues that the Internet has adversely affected how we think. We no longer deep read. He believes that because we are flooded with information through sources like Google we are losing the ability to synthesize information due to the over load of data. While he does state that technology like the Gutenburg Press was received with similar skepticism, his analysis focuses on the fact that the advancement in technology is changing the way we think and that is a bad thing.

The Economist

The Economist article takes a less aggressive stance toward the influence of the Internet and search upon our culture. The author agrees that we are changing but argues that is not necessarily a bad thing. The author continues to state that change is inevitable and if we continue to hold on to the status quo as though it is the only way to think and learn we will do ourselves and future generations a major disservice. The quote that resonated the most with me was the following:

So, no surprise that when we incarcerate teenagers of today in traditional classroom settings, they react with predictable disinterest and flunk their literacy tests. They are skilled in making sense not of a body of known content, but of contexts that are continually changing.

Teachers must recognise that our pedagogical tools are inconsistent with the skills needed to survive in a world where people are always connected to everyone and everything. In such a world, learning to think for oneself could well be more important than simply learning to read and write.

My Opinion

When examining technology’s influence upon our culture, of course it has changed us. Is that a bad thing?  Absolutely not. It provides us with opportunities and challenges that would have never been present if the technology was not available. It has made my students more globally aware. When I was my student’s age, I had did not know as much about events happening around the world. We were to simply memorize facts. Now my students are discussing global issues with schools around the world. Technology has also opened doors for people around the world to present their ideas and have a change to achieve the supposed “American Dream”.

Technology has “flattened” our world. Some like, Carr may argue that the technology has negatively influenced us as we now manage information. But I believe that the advantages of technology: the ability to connect to information almost instantly, the communal environment it has created, and the equity it has allowed heavily outweigh Carr’s argument.

Creative and innovative ideas are now more widely accessible and the ability to solve today’s global problems will be easier as you have more and more perspectives on these problems. Technology’s ability to connect people around the world builds upon the idea of the Wisdom of Crowds. Problems will be solved by not simply relying upon a few minds but opening them to the public. So while we may lose a few skills with the advancement of technology, it is technology that will help us save our planet.

photo credits: Mrs. Maze and Jimee, Jackie, Tom & Asha

The following articles both analyze the state of current technology and the impact it has upon our culture. I don’t have time tonight to write what I really think about these articles but I will publish my analysis tomorrow. For now, I want to present you the two articles so you can begin to make your own decisions upon the current impact of technology.

Anti Technology

This is an article written by Nicholas Carr of the Atlantic. The article is aptly titled, “Is Google Making Us Stupid?“. Carr takes a negative look at the advancement of technology and its influence upon our culture and how we think.

Pro Technology

An article written in the Economist, “From Literacy to Digiracy“, presents a more balanced view on the idea of technology and it’s influence upon our society.

Whether you agree with either author, they are engaging articles that will make you think about how technology is changing the way we think and work, for good or bad.

More tomorrow…

My school is in the process of beginning a 1 to 1 laptop program. Every student in the middle school will receive a Apple Mac Book at the beginning of next year. This is a great opportunity for the school and presents us with an opportunity to address the issue of how we deal with information on campus. In the past, we have had a great deal of trouble consolidating and simplifying the transfer of information. You had to go to multiple sites to locate assignments, documents. There was no uniformity, no constants.

That hopefully is to change. Because the students will be using their computers on a regular basis it is logical to think that the information the need should be found in one central location. This would create fewer books they need to carry as well as create a sense of transparency that the parents will appreciate.

This is where Google Applications steps in. Google Apps brings all the applications that we use into one location. A uniform start page that houses all the Google Apps, every teacher, student, and potentially parent could have access to the documents, calendars, email, and internal links that would bring all the information from homework assignments to internal news into one place.

Not only will Google Apps help organize resources for our students, it will also promote true collaboration. As we get further into the 21st century, the ability to collaborate both locally and globally will be a skill that is necessary for success in the “real” world. Google Apps provides this practice. The applications, Google Docs, Calendar and Talk allow for students and teachers to share ideas, work on assignments or lessons together online, and reduce the paper trail of emailed copies.

In an era where effectiveness and simplicity are necessary for success, Google Apps provides an option for schools to not only consolidate information but support collaborative and project based learning, ideas that support the authentic learning that our students need for their futures.

To learn more about Google Apps, watch this short video or take part in the tutorial.