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Tag Archive - consumer internet in education

Strategies for Adoption in Higher Education

June 29, 2010 in educational technology, higher-ed with 0 Comments

This is one of my responses to the call by the Gates Foundation for Next Generation Learning.  The question was “WHICH INTERACTIVE TECHNOLOGIES HAVE THE POTENTIAL TO BE MOST WIDELY ADOPTED AND WHY?”

To answer the question specifically: technologies that show the potential to be most widely adopted will have a combination of network effects, a sticky user experience, and a low-resistance path-to-market that focuses on users and circumvents institutional decision making.
Student-centered web services like Chegg, CourseHero, Cramster, Notehall, Zinch, Unigo, GulliverGo, ULoop, and others have the chance to get the widest distribution.
We can also assume that any innovative product will have highly social elements that tap into network effects.
Monetization does not necessarily follow distribution, (though Chegg is killing it).  The easiest way to monetize is to sell a product to the user or get in the lead gen game (like myedu.com did), but it’s also the easiest way to lose focus on bringing innovation to education.  In order to fully monetize the user base the service will need to offer products to the institution, using the extensive student distribution as a lever.  Zinch has this model, though it also plays the lead gen game.  The most high-profile company to pull this path-to-market off in the commercial world is Yammer.
When it comes to the thesis of Next Generation Learning, NextGen seems to skip the fact that consumer-focused products with sticky and simple user experiences will win big and be able to translate that into a new learning platform.  In particular, Watermelon Express has executed well on their product development. Grockit is also making a bold play with a similar test-prep like point of entry, but with a clear platform for a “DIY” Adaptive Learning Environment with gaming mechanics.
When it comes to course management products, either a disruptive model will have to back it’s way in or the new new thing will have to have an open-source distribution model with a value-added services business supporting it.  There’s simply not a real economy around EduPunks for the forseeable future, institutional adoption processes are slow and painful enough to kill any start up, and Blackboard is out to push out or scoop up anybody that gets traction.  In particular, I have hopes that someone will hone in on an opportunity around real-time classroom participation through the form of backchannelling here.  Drew Harry at MIT has open sourced his backchan.nl.  HotSeat came out of Purdue but I’m not sure how they plan to spin it off.  The good part about education is that there are lots of people willing to collaborate all across the world.

To answer the question specifically: technologies that show the potential to be most widely adopted will have a combination of network effects, a sticky user experience, and a low-resistance path-to-market that focuses on users and circumvents institutional decision making.

Student-centered web services like Chegg, CourseHero, Cramster, Notehall, Zinch, Unigo, GulliverGo, ULoop, and others have the chance to get the widest distribution.

We can also assume that any innovative product will have highly social elements that tap into network effects.

Monetization does not necessarily follow distribution, (though Chegg is killing it).  The easiest way to monetize is to sell a product to the user or get in the lead gen game (like myedu.com did), but it’s also the easiest way to lose focus on bringing innovation to education.  In order to fully monetize the user base the service will need to offer products to the institution, using the extensive student distribution as a lever.  Zinch has this model, though it also plays the lead gen game.  The most high-profile company to pull this path-to-market off in the commercial world is Yammer.

When it comes to the thesis of Next Generation Learning, NextGen seems to skip the fact that consumer-focused products with sticky and simple user experiences will win big and be able to translate that into a new learning platform.  In particular, Watermelon Express has executed well on their product development. Grockit is also making a bold play with a similar test-prep like point of entry, but with a clear platform for a “DIY” Adaptive Learning Environment with gaming mechanics.

When it comes to course management products, either a disruptive model will have to back it’s way in or the new new thing will have to have an open-source distribution model with a value-added services business supporting it.  There’s simply not a real economy around EduPunks for the forseeable future, institutional adoption processes are slow and painful enough to kill any start up, and Blackboard is out to push out or scoop up anybody that gets traction.  In particular, I have hopes that someone will hone in on an opportunity around real-time classroom participation through the form of backchannelling here.  Drew Harry at MIT has open sourced his backchan.nl.  HotSeat came out of Purdue but I’m not sure how they plan to spin it off.  The good part about education is that there are lots of people willing to collaborate all across the world.

Facebook atop Top Tools for Learning?

March 21, 2008 in educational technology, facebook with 1 Comment

John Curry, a professor of Instructional Technology at Oklahoma State University, listed his top ten tools for learning.  What I find very hearting about the list is that so few are actually an enterprise tool sold to educational institutions.  The rest are products targeting the general public for nothing specific to learning.  How is it that the tools most helpful to pedagogy do not have a pedagogical theorist’s underpinnings?

* Facebook
* Google
* Google Reader
* Garage Band
* iTunes
* Google Scholar
* del.icio.us
* Wink
* Blogs (in general)
* Desire2Learn
* Wikispaces
* Voicethread
* MyLabSchool
* Meebo

My theory on why educators and students prefer the consumer internet to enterprise solutions is the way they are created.

Enterprise solutions generally start with a political and bureaucratic process resulting with a requirements document that has too much in it.  The company works to meet those requirements, and by nature its delivered late and does half what was promised and typically doesn’t really function for a good while.  If they deliver the contracted item, they don’t make any more money if people actually like/use/come back to the site.

The consumer internet starts with a couple of dudes who put up something sticky and then use comprehensive user data to build a coherent user experience around a handful of major features.  They have to pay attention to user activation and retention to survive.  In fact, they must build something so compelling that users like it so much they go refer other people to the site.  What this should mean to education and educators is that consumer internet companies are a much more capable model of software development to build something that’s nice to use and is always up.