EDUCAUSE Research Snapshot | Leveraging Technology to Better Engage Students — from er.educause.edu
On 09/07/2016,
in 21st century, A/V -- audio/visual, Apple, Augmented Reality (AR), collaboration, health, platforms, tools, vendors, wearables,
by Daniel Christian
Here are the big announcements from Apple’s September 2016 event — from amp.imore.com
- iPhone 7
- Apple Watch Series 2
- Apple AirPods
- iOS 10
- watchOS 3
- iWork: Apple announced an update to its iWork productivity suite across iPhone, iPad, and Mac that allows for real-time collaboration within Pages, Keynote, and Numbers.
- Super Mario Run
What Apple’s Dual Camera iPhone Means For Augmented Reality — from vrscout.com
Excerpt:
Although there weren’t drastic changes made to the physical design of the iPhone (minus that old thing called a headphone jack), Apple’s unveiling of a dual-lens camera points to a world where millions of consumers could one day put a powerful augmented reality device in their pocket.
Apple kills headphone jack (1878 – 2016). RIP. — from techcrunch.com
Apple Unveils Waterproof iPhone 7 with Dual Cameras — from interestingengineering.com
iPhone 7 FAQ: Everything you need to know!— from amp.imore.com
Apple adds real-time collaboration to iWork –– from engadget.com
Apple is taking on Google Docs in the education market. (From DSC: I’d like to think so, but we’ll see.)
After 500 Million Downloads, ‘Pokemon Go’ Is Coming To Apple Watch — from uploadvr.com
Excerpt:
A brief demonstration of the game was featured on-stage. The watch edition of the game will place a bigger focus on player fitness, tracking the calories you burn in play sessions along with distance.
Apple Watch bands FAQ: Everything you need to know! — from amp.imore.com
On 09/02/2016,
in 21st century, analytics, Artificial Intelligence / Machine Learning / Deep Learning / Algorithms, bots, change, computer science, emerging technologies, future, game-changing environment, United States, universities,
by Daniel Christian
Stanford | One Hundred Year Study on Artificial Intelligence (AI100)
Executive Summary
Artificial Intelligence (AI) is a science and a set of computational technologies that are inspired by—but typically operate quite differently from—the ways people use their nervous systems and bodies to sense, learn, reason, and take action. While the rate of progress in AI has been patchy and unpredictable, there have been significant advances since the field’s inception sixty years ago. Once a mostly academic area of study, twenty-first century AI enables a constellation of mainstream technologies that are having a substantial impact on everyday lives. Computer vision and AI planning, for example, drive the video games that are now a bigger entertainment industry than Hollywood. Deep learning, a form of machine learning based on layered representations of variables referred to as neural networks, has made speech-understanding practical on our phones and in our kitchens, and its algorithms can be applied widely to an array of applications that rely on pattern recognition. Natural Language Processing (NLP) and knowledge representation and reasoning have enabled a machine to beat the Jeopardy champion and are bringing new power to Web searches.
While impressive, these technologies are highly tailored to particular tasks. Each application typically requires years of specialized research and careful, unique construction. In similarly targeted applications, substantial increases in the future uses of AI technologies, including more self-driving cars, healthcare diagnostics and targeted treatments, and physical assistance for elder care can be expected. AI and robotics will also be applied across the globe in industries struggling to attract younger workers, such as agriculture, food processing, fulfillment centers, and factories. They will facilitate delivery of online purchases through flying drones, self-driving trucks, or robots that can get up the stairs to the front door.
This report is the first in a series to be issued at regular intervals as a part of the One Hundred Year Study on Artificial Intelligence (AI100). Starting from a charge given by the AI100 Standing Committee to consider the likely influences of AI in a typical North American city by the year 2030, the 2015 Study Panel, comprising experts in AI and other relevant areas focused their attention on eight domains they considered most salient: transportation; service robots; healthcare; education; low-resource communities; public safety and security; employment and workplace; and entertainment. In each of these domains, the report both reflects on progress in the past fifteen years and anticipates developments in the coming fifteen years. Though drawing from a common source of research, each domain reflects different AI influences and challenges, such as the difficulty of creating safe and reliable hardware (transportation and service robots), the difficulty of smoothly interacting with human experts (healthcare and education), the challenge of gaining public trust (low-resource communities and public safety and security), the challenge of overcoming fears of marginalizing humans (employment and workplace), and the social and societal risk of diminishing interpersonal interactions (entertainment). The report begins with a reflection on what constitutes Artificial Intelligence, and concludes with recommendations concerning AI-related policy. These recommendations include accruing technical expertise about AI in government and devoting more resources—and removing impediments—to research on the fairness, security, privacy, and societal impacts of AI systems.
Contrary to the more fantastic predictions for AI in the popular press, the Study Panel found no cause for concern that AI is an imminent threat to humankind. No machines with self-sustaining long-term goals and intent have been developed, nor are they likely to be developed in the near future. Instead, increasingly useful applications of AI, with potentially profound positive impacts on our society and economy are likely to emerge between now and 2030, the period this report considers. At the same time, many of these developments will spur disruptions in how human labor is augmented or replaced by AI, creating new challenges for the economy and society more broadly. Application design and policy decisions made in the near term are likely to have long-lasting influences on the nature and directions of such developments, making it important for AI researchers, developers, social scientists, and policymakers to balance the imperative to innovate with mechanisms to ensure that AI’s economic and social benefits are broadly shared across society. If society approaches these technologies primarily with fear and suspicion, missteps that slow AI’s development or drive it underground will result, impeding important work on ensuring the safety and reliability of AI technologies. On the other hand, if society approaches AI with a more open mind, the technologies emerging from the field could profoundly transform society for the better in the coming decades.
From DSC:
I’m a bit more cautious and skeptical on the potential uses of AI than this panel. Though there will likely be many positive impacts of AI on society, I see plenty in our world that drives my skepticism (one such example is the use of AI and robotics that are being leveraged/developed by the large military operations of the world).
On 09/01/2016,
in Asia, Canada, disruption, Europe, geography / geology, global / globalization, higher education, ideas, India, pace of change, presentations, society, student-related, the downsides of how people use tech, UK, United States, vision/possibilities,
by Daniel Christian
Elon Musk speech: ‘The dumbest experiment in history’ — with thanks to Mr. Joe Byerwalter for this resource
Also see:
Dear College Students: You Should Take Geology — from wired.com by Erik Klemetti
Excerpt:
Few disciplines in today’s world play such a significant role in how society operates and what we can do to protect our future. Few fields of study can play such a profound role in protecting people’s lives on a daily basis, whether you realize it or not. And few can bring together so many disparate ideas, from sciences to social sciences to humanities to the arts, like the study of the Earth can.
…
Here are some of the ways that taking a course in the geology will impact your life for the rest of it.
…
Climate: Now, so far I’ve talked about all the fun parts of geology. However, if you’re looking for work that is important to you, your family and society across the planet, geology is the place to be. First off, geology is ground zero for understanding climate change across the history of Earth. We’ve been studying the variation in the planet’s ecosystems for two centuries now (heck, paleontology helped start the discipline) and can look back billions of years to see how the climate has varied. This gives us that evidence to show how much our current climate is likely in a state of distress. Geology is also how we can understand what the impact of climate change will be on our planet, both in the short- and long-term.
On 09/01/2016,
in A/V -- audio/visual, attention, Augmented Reality (AR), education technology, educational games / serious games, emerging technologies, engagement / engaging students, Google, health, higher education, human-computer interaction (HCI), innovation, journalism, K-12 related, learning, learning ecosystem, learning preferences, media/film, relationships, society, user experience (UX), vendors, Virtual Reality (VR) / worlds / learning,
by Daniel Christian
Virtual reality: The hype, the problems and the promise — from bbc.com by Tim Maughan
It’s the technology that is supposed to be 2016’s big thing, but what iteration of VR will actually catch on, and what’s just a fad? Tim Maughan takes an in-depth look.
Excerpt:
For Zec this is one of VR’s most promising potentials – to be able to drop audiences into a situation and force them to react emotionally, in ways that traditional filmmaking or journalism might struggle to do. “We really cannot understand what the people [in Syria and other places] right now are going through, so I thought maybe if we put the viewer inside the shoes of the family, or near them, maybe they can feel more and understand more rather than just reading a headline in a newspaper.”
The aim of Blackout is to challenge assumptions New Yorkers might have about the people around them, by allowing them to tap directly into their thoughts. “You’re given the ability to pick into people’s minds and their motives,” says co-creator Alex Porter. “Through that process you start to realise the ways in which you were wrong about all the people around you, and start to find these kind of exciting stories that they have to tell.”
From DSC:
Virtual Reality could have a significant impact in diversity training. (I don’t like the word diversity too much; as in my experience, everybody in the Fortune 5oo companies where I worked belonged in the realm of diversity except for Christians, but I’ll use it here anyway.)
The point is…when you can put yourself into someone else’s shoes, it could have some positive impact in terms of better being able to relate to what that person is going through.
Star Trek in VR – Why can’t we do this with VR in education? — from digitalbodies.net by Maya Georgieva
Excerpt:
What if there was a new way to start this journey? What if you walked into the room and boarded a starship instead? What would a school experience be like if we sent our students on a mission, joining a global team to learn and solve our world’s most pressing problems? What if they met in Virtual Reality? For example, literally experiencing the streets of Paris if they were studying French culture or urban planning. Examining first hand the geology of volcanoes or building the next generation transportation? What would happen if they are given a problem they could not answer on their own, a problem that requires collaboration and teamwork with colleagues to find a solution?
Here is how VR and AI can empower the future of learning. The Star Trek: Bridge Crew VR Game gives us a glimpse of how we can engage with our students. Or, as Levar Burton (Geordi La Forge from Engineering) in the video trailer puts it:
There is something different being in a shared virtual environment . . . The team does not succeed unless everybody does their job well.
…
In the true spirit of Star Trek it is through cooperation rather than competition that we learn best. In VR, you can sit on any of the crew chairs and be the captain, engineer, or doctor and experience events from very different point of views. In Star Trek: Bridge Crew, you are flying the ship but have to work collaboratively with your team. You have to work with your crew to reach goals and accomplish the mission as this is virtual reality as a social experience. It demands that you be fully engaged.
Not just for gamers: CSU launching Virtual Reality Initiative — from source.colostate.edu by Lauren Klamm
Excerpt:
Think “virtual reality,” and it’s probably video gaming that comes to mind. CSU is looking to expand the breadth and depth of this emerging technical field with a campus-wide Virtual Reality Initiative, launching this semester.
The initiative will give students and the science community hands-on experience with virtual reality, for research and educational applications.
Virtual reality (VR) is a way of experiencing virtual worlds or objects – the cockpit of a spaceship, an anatomy lesson, a walk through a historical building – through devices like computers, goggles or headsets designed to immerse someone in a simulated environment. VR touches fields ranging from design to art to engineering.
VR Learning: How Virtual Reality Will Democratize Learning — from iamvr.co
Excerpt:
In case you haven’t heard, there is a lot of hype right now about virtual and augmented reality. Three months into 2016, investors have already spent 1.1 billion dollars to get a piece of the action.
Still, I am confident that virtual reality will revolutionize how we learn, and the reason is simple. Virtual reality is not just a technology, it’s a medium. And I’ve seen how powerful that medium can be.
A Chinese surgeon has discovered a practical application for augmented reality in the medical field. Using the same technology by which a Pokemon character is layered onto a real-life setting, two surgical images can be combined into a single view, eliminating the need for surgeons to watch two separate screens simultaneously.
Catherine Chan Po-ling, a surgeon in Hong Kong and co-founder of MedEXO Robotics, says that the use of augmented reality technology in keyhole, or minimally invasive, surgery can solve one of the biggest problems for surgeons performing these procedures.
Currently, surgeons in keyhole procedures must create and view two images simultaneously. In Chan’s example, when checking for cancerous cells in the liver, the surgeon operates a regular camera showing a view of the surface of the liver, and at the same time operates an ultrasound probe to check beneath the surface of the liver.
Stanford Journalism Program’s Guide to Using Virtual Reality for Storytelling — from storybench.org by Geri Migielicz and Janine Zacharia
Excerpt:
Given the explosion of interest in virtual reality among media organizations, we sought in January to establish best practices and ideal scenarios for using the technology in storytelling through our inaugural immersive journalism class at Stanford University.
During the 10-week course, 12 undergraduate and graduate students evaluated a range of virtual reality experiences published by the New York Times, Wall Street Journal, ABC News and others. We compared commercially available virtual reality headsets (Google Cardboard, HTC Vive, Samsung Gear/VR and Oculus Rift) for ease and quality as well as virtual reality cameras — the (more expensive but expansive) GoPro and the (more affordable) Ricoh Theta S.
12 ways to use Google Cardboard in your class — from ditchthattextbook.com
Excerpt:
Virtual reality used to be the thing of science fiction books and movies. Now, it’s inexpensive, works with the technology we carry in our pockets, and can transform us to real and imaginary places.
These 5 Incredible HoloLens Videos Will Make You A VR/AR Believer — from uploadvr.com
Upload And Make School Graduate Their First Class Of VR Developers — from uploadvr.com
On 09/01/2016,
in business, career development, corporate / business world, corporate universities / corporate training, online learning, training / L&D, vendors, workplace,
by Daniel Christian
Coursera for Business launches to tap the billion-dollar corporate e-learning market — from venturebeat.com by Paul Sawers
Excerpt:
Online education company Coursera has launched a new business-focused offering aimed at giving enterprises a direct pipeline for training and development resources.
Founded out of Mountain View, California in 2012, Coursera partners with universities and other educational institutions to serve more than 20 million online students a range of courses across business, technology, science, and more. Now, with Coursera for Business, the California-based company has opened itself to additional revenues from the lucrative corporate e-learning market, which some reports suggest was worth $12 billion in the U.S. alone in 2015 and could hit $31 billion globally by 2020.
Also see:
Coursera expands into corporate learning and development — techcrunch.com by Lora Kolodny
Excerpt:
Coursera, the education tech platform that offers online courses from prestigious colleges and universities, is branching into corporate learning and development and has officially launched Coursera for Business today.
Coursera CEO Rick Levin, formerly the president of Yale University, told TechCrunch that the move was a natural one for the startup.
“We have 21 million registered users and are adding about half-a-million registered users per month. When we looked at the email addresses of our learners… we would see thousands signing up from one corporate email domain, ten thousand in one case,” he said.
That was an indication large employers already were, or would be interested in using Coursera to help employees with professional development.