trends

Student debt is over $1.6 trillion and hardly anyone is paying down their loans [Cox]

On 01/31/2020, in 21st century, colleges, cost of getting a degree, higher education, parents/guardians, society, student-related, trends, United States, youth, by Daniel Christian

Student debt is over $1.6 trillion and hardly anyone is paying down their loans — from cnbc.comby Jeff Cox; with a shout out to Ryan Craig’s Gap Letter for this resource and the resource mentioned below

Excerpts:

Student loan debt totals more than $1.6 trillion and is not shrinking as few borrowers have reduced their balances, according to Moody’s.
High student loan balances are having multiple negative economic effects, such as restricting household formation, Moody’s said.
Outstanding loans total more than $1.6 trillion, more than doubling over the last decade and tripling since 2006.
In the meantime, the burden of student loans continues to be felt with an 11% default rate that is the highest of any debt category. Education also is now second only to mortgages as the highest form of debt for all Americans.

Also see:

Survey: Student loan debt is a key factor for Gen Z when making career decisions — from prnewswire.com
Gen Z’s concern over student loan debt drives them to prioritize finances over passion when making career choices

Things I Learned at Project Voice — from thejournal.com by Bradley Metrock, who produces the Project Voice conference, hosts This Week in Voice
Could 2020 be the year of the voice? These voice experts think so.

Excerpt:

Voice experience of the year for education, with these finalists:

Sermo Labs’ 1-2-3 Math;
Bamboo Math;
Voicelets, to help students learn by listening;
Highlights Storybooks from Bamboo; and
Novel Effect, a voice-driven storytelling app for families.

Highlights took this category.

And voice developer of the year, with these finalists:

Pretzel Labs, a voice design studio
Sermo Labs
Voicelets
Bamboo Learning
Novel Effect

Bamboo Learning won this award.

Also see:

12 Education Predictions for 2020 — by Dian Schaffhauser
The learning and innovation in education never stops. Here’s what 12 education technology experts and observers expect for the new year in K-12.

Why you should care about what’s happening with law schools and the legal realm in general!

On 01/23/2020, in 21st century, Access to Justice (A2J), Artificial Intelligence/Agents/LLMs/and Related, career development, change, collaboration, dangers of the status quo, Daniel S. Christian, emerging technologies, entrepreneurship, ethics, faith, future, game-changing environment, global / globalization, higher education, human-computer interaction (HCI), ideas, innovation, law schools, legal technologies, legislatures / government / legal, morals/values, online learning, pace of change, platforms, policy, political science, professional development, society, technologies for your home, technology (general), the downsides of how people use tech, trends, Uncategorized, United States, universities, vendors, vision/possibilities, youth, by Daniel Christian

From DSC:
As some of you may know, I’m now working for the WMU-Thomas M. Cooley Law School. My faith gets involved here, but I believe that the LORD wanted me to get involved with:

Using technology to increase access to justice (#A2J)
Contributing to leveraging the science of learning for the long-term benefit of our students, faculty, and staff
Raising awareness regarding the potential pros and cons of today’s emerging technologies
Increase the understanding that the legal realm has a looooong way to go to try to get (even somewhat) caught up with the impacts that such emerging technologies can/might have on us.
Contributing and collaborating with others to help develop a positive future, not a negative one.

Along these lines…in regards to what’s been happening with law schools over the last few years, I wanted to share a couple of things:

1) An article from The Chronicle of Higher Education by Benjamin Barton:

2) A response from our President and Dean, James McGrath:

From DSC:
I also wanted to personally say that I arrived at WMU-Cooley Law School in 2018, and have been learning a lot there (which I love about my job!). Cooley employees are very warm, welcoming, experienced, knowledgeable, and professional. Everyone there is mission-driven. My boss, Chris Church, is multi-talented and excellent. Cooley has a great administrative/management team as well.

There have been many exciting, new things happening there. But that said, it will take time before we see the results of these changes. Perseverance and innovation will be key ingredients to crafting a modern legal education — especially in an industry that is just now beginning to offer online-based courses at the Juris Doctor (J.D.) level (i.e., 20 years behind when this began occurring within undergraduate higher education).

My point in posting this is to say that we should ALL care about what’s happening within the legal realm! We are all impacted by it, whether we realize it or not. We are all in this together and no one is an island — not as individuals, and not as organizations.

We need:

Far more diversity within the legal field
More technical expertise within the legal realm — not only with lawyers, but with legislators, senators, representatives, judges, others
Greater use of teams of specialists within the legal field
To offer more courses regarding emerging technologies — and not only for the legal practices themselves but also for society at large.
To be far more vigilant in crafting a positive world to be handed down to our kids and grandkids — a dream, not a nightmare. Just because we can, doesn’t mean we should.

Still not convinced that you should care? Here are some things on the CURRENT landscapes:

You go to drop something off at your neighbor’s house. They have a camera that gets activated. What facial recognition database are you now on? Did you give your consent to that? No, you didn’t.
Because you posted your photo on Facebook, YouTube, Venmo and/or on millions of other websites, your face could be in ClearView AI’s database. Did you give your consent to that occurring? No, you didn’t.
You’re at the airport and facial recognition is used instead of a passport. Whose database was that from and what gets shared? Did you give your consent to that occurring? Probably not, and it’s not easy to opt-out either.
Numerous types of drones, delivery bots, and more are already coming onto the scene. What will the sidewalks, streets, and skies look like — and sound like — in your neighborhood in the near future? Is that how you want it? Did you give your consent to that happening? No, you didn’t.
…and on and on it goes.

Addendum — speaking of islands!

Palantir CEO: Silicon Valley can’t be on ‘Palo Alto island’ — Big Tech must play by the rules — from cnbc.com by Jessica Bursztynsky

Excerpt:

Palantir Technologies co-founder and CEO Alex Karp said Thursday the core problem in Silicon Valley is the attitude among tech executives that they want to be separate from United States regulation.

“You cannot create an island called Palo Alto Island,” said Karp, who suggested tech leaders would rather govern themselves. “What Silicon Valley really wants is the canton of Palo Alto. We have the United States of America, not the ‘United States of Canton,’ one of which is Palo Alto. That must change.”

“Consumer tech companies, not Apple, but the other ones, have basically decided we’re living on an island and the island is so far removed from what’s called the United States in every way, culturally, linguistically and in normative ways,” Karp added.

A.I. breakthroughs in natural-language processing are big for business [Kahn]

On 01/21/2020, in 21st century, analytics, Artificial Intelligence/Agents/LLMs/and Related, bots, business, career development, corporate / business world, emerging technologies, Natural Language Processing (NLP), tools, trends, vendors, by Daniel Christian

A.I. breakthroughs in natural-language processing are big for business — from fortune.com by Jeremy Kahn

Excerpt:

Over the past 18 months, though, computer scientists have made huge strides in creating algorithms with unprecedented abilities at a variety of language tasks. What’s more, these new algorithms are making the leap from the lab and into real products at a breakneck pace—already changing the way tech’s biggest players, and many other businesses, operate. The Natural Language Processing (NLP) revolution promises better search engines and smarter chatbots and digital assistants. It could lead to systems that automatically analyze—and maybe even compose— legal documents and medical records. But some believe the NLP revolution will do far more.

20 digital transformation leaders to follow on Twitter in 2020 — from enterprisersproject.com by David. F. Carr
Committed to digital transformation this year? Follow these people for perspective and emerging lessons

Excerpt:

One of our New Year’s resolutions was to refresh and expand our Twitter feed for digital transformation leaders, reviewing them not just for the use of the right hashtags but for the content they share.

There are a few repeats from a similar list we shared last year, but for the most part, we tried to give you new Twitter handles to follow. This year’s list includes CIOs, authors, consultants, and cloud computing leaders. Some only post on technology topics, while others share thoughts on family, culture, politics, and favorite movies.

The common denominator we looked for was a thoughtfully curated feed that’s not entirely self-promotional but adds to the conversation we’re all having about how to understand the potential of digital transformation and put it to work for our organizations.

From DSC:
While these types of lists invariably leave off a ton of extremely talented individuals and organizations who are worth following as well, such lists are a good starting point for:

Someone to use to begin tapping into streams of content in a given area
Observing the topics, issues, ideas being discussed
Building one’s network
Seeing who these folks follow and who they respect
…and more.

Searching for the top __ people of Twitter in subject XYZ is a solid way to enhance our [lifelong] learning ecosystems.

Reflections on “Technology Trends: The evolution of #ML and #AI in 2020”

On 01/20/2020, in Artificial Intelligence/Agents/LLMs/and Related, change, Daniel S. Christian, emerging technologies, future, game-changing environment, human-computer interaction (HCI), India, trends, by Daniel Christian

Technology Trends: The evolution of machine learning and artificial intelligence in 2020 — from dqindia.com
Technology trends in the upcoming year will focus on how new age technologies such as machine learning and artificial intelligence will advance

Excerpt:

While technology trends in the past year revolved around making machine learning and artificial intelligence accessible for everyone, this year will be about how these technologies will evolve to benefit businesses. With the beginning of 2020, Ramesh SivaSubramanian, Head of Ramco Innovation Lab, Singapore has made technology predictions. The following is a gist on each key technology trend.

From DSC:
Looking at these trends, is this the future we want? While some of these are positive trends, some of these ring of distrust to me…and could easily be steering toward a dystopian future, such as this one (emphasis mine):

Improving attendance and workplace access using Facial Recognition
2020 will see significant workplace adoption of facial recognition, especially for customer-centric and cybersecurity functions. Enterprises which adopt this capability, especially those with sizeable workforces, will reduce if not eliminate the tedium of keeping track of employees. It will also solve many issues related to password and access cards, saving even more time and costs.

From DSC:
Very disturbing that citizens had no say in this. Legislators, senators, representatives, lawyers, law schools, politicians, engineers, programmers, professors, teachers, and more…please reflect upon our current situation here. How can we help create the kind of future that we can hand down to our kids and rest well at night…knowing we did all that we could to provide a dream — and not a nightmare — for them?

The Secretive Company That Might End Privacy as We Know It — from nytimes.com by Kashmir Hill
A little-known start-up helps law enforcement match photos of unknown people to their online images — and “might lead to a dystopian future or something,” a backer says.

His tiny company, Clearview AI, devised a groundbreaking facial recognition app. You take a picture of a person, upload it and get to see public photos of that person, along with links to where those photos appeared. The system — whose backbone is a database of more than three billion images that Clearview claims to have scraped from Facebook, YouTube, Venmo and millions of other websites — goes far beyond anything ever constructed by the United States government or Silicon Valley giants.

Excerpts:

“But without public scrutiny, more than 600 law enforcement agencies have started using Clearview in the past year…”

Clearview’s app carries extra risks because law enforcement agencies are uploading sensitive photos to the servers of a company whose ability to protect its data is untested.

8 AI trends we’re watching in 2020 [Magoulas ]

On 01/15/2020, in 21st century, analytics, Artificial Intelligence/Agents/LLMs/and Related, cloud-based computing / apps / other cloud-related, corporate / business world, corporate universities / corporate training, data related items, emerging technologies, learning, lifelong learning, staying relevant, training / L&D, trends, vendors, workplace, by Daniel Christian

Excerpts:

We see the AI space poised for an acceleration in adoption, driven by more sophisticated AI models being put in production, specialized hardware that increases AI’s capacity to provide quicker results based on larger datasets, simplified tools that democratize access to the entire AI stack, small tools that enables AI on nearly any device, and cloud access to AI tools that allow access to AI resources from anywhere.

To fully take advantage of AI technologies, you’ll need to retrain your entire organization.

DC: Precursor to a next gen learning platform…? Another piece is falling into place.

On 01/11/2020, in 21st century, 24x7x365 access, adult learning, analytics, Artificial Intelligence/Agents/LLMs/and Related, cloud-based computing / apps / other cloud-related, communities of practice, corporate / business world, corporate universities / corporate training, cost of getting a degree, credentialing, Daniel S. Christian, digital learning, digital storytelling, disruption, education, education reform, education technology, educational games / serious games, emerging technologies, future, future of higher education, game-changing environment, global / globalization, heutagogy, higher education, homeschooling/homeschoolers, human-computer interaction (HCI), ideas, innovation, intelligent systems, intelligent tutoring, learner profiles, learning, learning ecosystem, Learning from the Living [Class] Room, learning hubs & pods & microschooling, learning preferences, learning spaces, lifelong learning, marketplaces, microlearning, MOOCs -- Massive Open Online Courses, more voice more choice more control, multimedia, Natural Language Processing (NLP), online learning, online media, online tutoring, personalized/customized learning, platforms, simulations, social learning / networks, society, staying relevant, streams of content, student-related, surviving, technologies for your home, tools, training / L&D, trends, TVs, United States, universities, usability, user experience (UX), using teams, vendors, videoconferencing, virtual field trips, virtual K-12 schools, Virtual Reality (VR) / worlds / learning, virtual tutoring, vision/possibilities, voice recognition / voice enabled interfaces, web-based collaboration, webinars, youth, by Daniel Christian

DC: Precursor to a next gen learning platform…? I think it's one of the pieces of the puzzle that's coming together.

Google just revealed that 500M people around the world are using Google Assistant.https://t.co/6uHXUUIYVb #AI #global #NLP #InstructionalDesign #learning pic.twitter.com/hSp0sa79k3

— Daniel Christian (@dchristian5) January 11, 2020

How AI is disrupting the legal tech industry [Chau]

On 01/07/2020, in Artificial Intelligence/Agents/LLMs/and Related, change, changing business models, collaboration, emerging technologies, ideas, innovation, law schools, legal technologies, legislatures / government / legal, new business models, strategy, trends, vision/possibilities, by Daniel Christian

How AI is disrupting the legal tech industry — from itproportal.com by Derek Chau
Law firms will benefit from a growing ability to deliver high-value, strategic services while leveraging the ability of AI to execute lower value tasks.

Excerpt:

As increasingly complex AI solutions emerge, the technology continues to capture imaginations across the legal community. AI has become a catalyst for change within the legal ecosystem. And as platforms become more sophisticated, companies have begun to tap into ever-expanding automation and scalability.

Potential impacts/applications include:

Legal research (due diligence)
Predicting legal outcomes
Contract management
Intellectual property law

This reality is driven by the democratisation of legal services as a result of AI integrations. The movement is poised to lower the costs associated with corporate transactions, legal research, IP transactions, and related services. As such, law firms will benefit from a growing ability to deliver high-value, strategic services while leveraging the ability of AI to execute lower value tasks.

‘Fundamental shift’ is transforming the delivery of legal services, new report concludes [Cassens Weiss]

On 01/07/2020, in change, changing business models, disruption, law schools, legal technologies, legislatures / government / legal, new business models, tools, trends, United States, universities, using teams, workplace, by Daniel Christian

‘Fundamental shift’ is transforming the delivery of legal services, new report concludes — from abajournal.com by Debra Cassens Weiss

Excerpt:

“Revolutionary changes are afoot” in the market for legal services, according to a new report.

Clients are actively managing their relationships with outside counsel, nonlaw competitors are gaining ground, and law firms are responding to market changes in innovative ways, the report says.

The 2020 Report on the State of the Legal Market was released Monday by Georgetown Law’s Center on Ethics and the Legal Profession and Thomson Reuters Legal Executive Institute. It is available for download here.

However, taking that view is seeing only one side of the story. Over this same period, there has been mounting evidence that the underlying model itself is changing, that clients, non-law firm competitors, and even many law firms are now operating with very different assumptions about the role law firm services should play in the legal ecosystem and how such services should be delivered. In the past year or so, this evidence has grown to the point that it seems apparent that a fundamental shift is now well underway.

Also see:

A Future Focus: The Success of Legal Tech Depends on Transformation, Not Automation — from law.com by Zach Warren
Legal technology has incrementally shifted law in recent years, but true transformation isn’t incremental. The next decade has the potential to change that.
Legal Tech’s Predictions for Legal Innovation in 2020 — from law.com by Zach Warren
From blockchain and cryptocurrency to new skillsets for lawyers, here’s what lawyers and technologists see as the future of law—coming in 2020.

Lori Lorenzo, research and insights leader of chief legal officer program, Deloitte: “Catching-up and keeping-up with tech advancements for the legal function will remain a top goal for chief legal officers in 2020. Of course, addressing legal team tech skills gaps may drive inclusion of professionals with diverse skillsets, like data scientists, automation experts and the like, into the legal function.”

Generation Z and online tutoring: natural bedfellows? [Ingram]

On 01/07/2020, in career development, Daniel S. Christian, future, future of higher education, game-changing environment, generational differences, global / globalization, K-12 related, online learning, online tutoring, student teaching/teacher education, student-related, teachers, trends, UK, United States, by Daniel Christian

Generation Z and online tutoring: natural bedfellows? — from innovatemyschool.com by John Ingram

Excerpt:

The K-12 online tutoring market is booming around the world, with recent research estimating it to grow by 12% per year over the next five years, a USD $60bn increase. By breaking down geographic barriers and moving beyond the limits of local teaching expertise, online tutoring is an especially valuable tool for those looking to supplement their studies in the developing world, and students globally are increasingly signing up to online tuition early on in their secondary education schooling.

Several reasons lie behind this growth.

Legal Tech’s Predictions for Artificial Intelligence in 2020 — from law.com by Zach Warren
We may not have robot lawyers, but lawyers and technologists agree that artificial intelligence will have a major impact on the legal profession in 2020.

Excerpts:

Alex Babin, CEO, Zero: “The biggest gains from automating legal practices will be time saved and improved workflow efficiencies as the AI ‘takes over’ more laborious tasks including litigation support, email, e-discovery, and the use of databases for case management. Lawyers will begin to trust in this process, letting AI perform these basic tasks such as auto-filing document and email for compliance. AI will enhance corporate and regulatory reporting and improves contract creation and management.”

Scott Forman, shareholder, Littler Mendelson and founder of Littler CaseSmart and Littler onDemand: “Data analytics and AI have already fundamentally changed the delivery of legal services, but I expect 2020 to bring a greater understanding of how these technologies enhance, rather than overtake, the work of lawyers. While robots and technology will never replace lawyers, they provide data and insight enabling lawyers to do their jobs faster and better. This includes automating aspects of the legal process—so that lawyers can focus on top-of-the-pyramid work—as well as synthesizing and serving up information that guides litigation strategy, identifies potential areas of risk and moves toward predicting legal outcomes.”

I vote against this! “From pizza to transplant organs: What drones will be delivering in the 2020s” [Dormehl]

On 01/04/2020, in 21st century, Artificial Intelligence/Agents/LLMs/and Related, dangers of the status quo, Daniel S. Christian, emerging technologies, robotics, society, technologies for your home, the downsides of how people use tech, trends, United States, user experience (UX), youth, by Daniel Christian

From pizza to transplant organs: What drones will be delivering in the 2020s — from digitaltrends.com by Luke Dormehl

Excerpt:

From drone racing to drone photography, quadcopters and other unmanned aerial vehicles rose to prominence in the 2010s. But in the decade to come they’re going to become an even bigger thing in the next 10 years. Case in point: Deliveries by drone.

Who should you be watching in this space?

From DSC:
While I appreciate Luke’s reporting on this, I am very much against darkening the skies with noisy machines. Again, we adults need to be very careful of the world that we are developing for our kids! If items could be delivered via a system of underground pipes, that would be a different, quieter, not visible, more agreeable approach for me.

Just because we can…

Some of the topics/items mentioned include:

Technologists join lawyers in creating the legal realm of the future.
Future lawyers will need to either have project managers on staff or be able to manage projects themselves.
Lifelong learning is now critically important. One doesn’t necessarily need to be able to code, but one needs to be constantly learning.
Need to understand legal principles but you will also need to have augmented skills (which will differ from person to person)
New business and delivery models. Don’t presuppose that the current model will always be around.
There will be fewer traditional roles/practices. Traditional roles are sunsetting; new skillsets are needed.
Students: Do your due diligence; read up on the industry and think about whether there’s a good fit. Learn your craft. Get experience. Be who you are. Bring your unique brand to the table.

Learning Ecosystems

‘Fundamental shift’ is transforming the delivery of legal services, new report concludes [Cassens Weiss]

Categories

Tags