Learning Ecosystems

TVs are becoming the next app battleground — from by Emily Adler

Excerpt:

The app store phenomenon, centered on smartphones and tablets, has been the biggest story in software for the past five years.

Its next logical destination: the living room, via smart TVs and set-top boxes connected to the Internet.

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• The smart TV app revolution is inevitable: People spend four hours in front of their TVs in the U.S., and 63% of all global ad spending goes to TVs. The old guard, represented by cable and entertainment conglomerates, will not be able to fend off improvements like those that apps are bringing to mobile phones.
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• The smart TV revolution will not just be led by new TVs with built-in Internet connections, it will also result from consumer adoption of less expensive game consoles or set-top boxes like Roku and Apple TV, which transform traditional TVs into smart TVs with access to app stores. At least 20% of U.S. consumers already have their TVs connected in one of these ways.

From DSC:

1. Keep an eye on the convergence of the telephone, the television, and the computer.
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2. Start thinking of ways that you could provide learning/educationally-based experiences with second screen apps. What would that experience look and act like?
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3. If such “channels” come to fruition — and happen to coincide with MOOCs and advances in cognitive computing (such as IBM’s Watson) — the word disruption comes to mind.
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4. The trick, then, will be to offer streams of content that are relevant, and up-to-date.
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5. Such a platform could be used in learning hubs throughout the world, as well as in hybrid/blended classrooms — while also addressing lifelong learners from their living rooms.
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6. Such a platform could take Communities of Practice to an entirely new level.

Addendum/also see: