From DSC:
When I first saw the graphs (below) from Mary Meeker’s 2012 KPCB Internet Trends Year-End Update — as a technologist — my mind/focus went to the increasing pace of change/adoption of technologies. But another way to view these graphs would be to ask:
What does this say about society’s expectations? About society’s use of technology?
Are folks willing to wait around as long as they used to? Apparently, not as much these days.
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10 ways the role of web designer is changing — from creativebloq.comby Sush Kelly
From DSC:
In my experience, there are numerous demanding aspects to being or becoming a web designer, as you have to:
How NOT to design a MOOC: The disaster at Coursera and how to fix it — from onlinelearninginsights.wordpress.com by Debbie Morrison
Excerpt/update:
Note: I’m also enrolled in Coursera’s E-learning and Digital Cultures, with University of Edinburgh, which is so far excellent. What I wrote in this post is exclusive to the course Fundamentals of Online Education: Planning and Application. I also completed Introduction to Sociology, through Coursera last year which was quite good.
Update: This course is now ‘suspended’. Participants received this email February 2, at 4:17 pm (PST). “We want all students to have the highest quality learning experience. For this reason, we are temporarily suspending the “Fundamentals of Online Education: Planning and Application” course in order to make improvements. We apologize for any inconvenience that this may cause. We will inform you when the course will be reoffered.”
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From DSC:
There will be many more disasters I’m sure. But as with learning, failure is to be expected (some would say mandatory) and learning is messy. This is especially true when technological change and innovation are moving at ever-increasing speeds.
The questions that comes to my mind after reading this are:
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The coming automatic, freaky, contextual world and why we’re writing a book about it — from scobleizer.comby Robert Scoble
Excerpt (emphasis DSC):
First, the short version of today’s news. Shel Israel and I are collaborating on a book, titled, The Age of Context: How it Will Change Your Life and Work.
The long version:
A new world is coming. It’s scary. Freaky. Over the freaky line, if you will. But it is coming. Investors like Ron Conway and Marc Andreessen are investing in it. Companies from Google to startups you’ve never heard of, like Wovyn or Highlight, are building it. With more than a couple of new ones already on the way that you’ll hear about over the next six months.
First, the trends. We’re seeing something new happen because of:
Also see:
Also see:
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Book Description
Release date: January 18, 2013
The Information Age? Think again.
Change is everywhere: how we communicate, what we do for a living, the values we hold, the way we raise our children, even the way we access information. Thanks to a global economy, the force of the Internet, and the explosion of mobile technology, we have—almost imperceptibly—been ushered into a new era, the Shift Age, in which change happens so quickly that it’s become the norm.
Man-made developments—such as tools, machines, and technology—defined previous ages, but the Shift Age will be defined by our own power of choice. In Entering the Shift Age, leading futurist David Houle argues that we are going through a major collapse of legacy thinking, eroding many of the thought structures that have defined the last two hundred years of humanity. Houle identifies and explains the new forces that will shape our lives—including remote workplaces, the cloud, “24/7” culture, speed-of-light connectivity, creativity, and the influence of Millenials and Digital Natives—for the next twenty years.
In this eye-opening book, Houle navigates this pivotal point in human history with clarity and anticipation, focusing on the power of human consciousness and the direct influence we can impart on everything from healthcare to media to education. According to Houle, we are more independent than ever before. We are in control.
There’s no “going back” to the way things were. Reality is changing ever faster, and ENTERING THE SHIFT AGE is your guide to keeping up.
From DSC:
Though I haven’t read the book, I would probably take a different angle/perspective on some things here. Yet, this work seems important in that it addresses the constant change — and pace of change — that we find ourselves and our world in.
Less is more — from Harold Jarche
Excerpts:
If you were to sum up the psychology of learning in three words, it would be ‘less is more’. – Donald Clark
In FrogDesign’s presentation on Design is Hacking How we Learn, slide #27 clearly shows where the emphasis of our learning efforts should be, and where organizations should place the most support and resources: practice.
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From DSC:
In the corporate world, my thought is to provide the training as to where and how employees can get/stay in the know — especially by encouraging the use and ownership of blogs, social media, and developing/leveraging their personal learning networks. But also to provide the infrastructure and tools — the plumbing if you will — to allow for people to quickly connect with each other and to easily share information with each other (i.e. to develop their own learning ecosystems). Formal classes won’t cut it. As Harold and other members of the Internet Alliance have long been saying, it’s about informal learning. (Speaking of his Internet Alliance colleagues, Charles Jennings recently discussed how the pace of change is affecting the corporate world big time; and, just as in higher ed, being able to adapt is key to staying relevant.)
As a relevant aside…my issue with my Master’s Program in Instructional Design for Online Learning was that there was too much emphasis on theory and not enough emphasis on practice.
110 predictions for the next 110 years — from popularmechanics.com with thanks to Erik Brynjolfsson (@erikbryn) for posting this on twitter
From DSC:
Normally, I don’t care for these sorts of massive listings — 100 ways to…, 10,000 tools to check out…, etc. But I like peering into the future. So this caught my eye. Such predictions also illustrate the pace of change and that our kids will be growing up in a world very different from the one we grew up in.
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Digital Revolution’s Winners And Losers — from Information Week by John Foley
Workers with in-demand digital skills benefit most as computers increasingly take over
everyday tasks. In this InformationWeek 500 video, MIT’s Erik Brynjolfsson discusses
how this trend could affect your enterprise.
Smartphone adoption rate fastest in tech history — from pcmag.com by Stephanie Mlot
Excerpt:
When smartphone technology was created more than a decade ago, it was simply a small step for connected man–no one knew what a giant leap for mankind it would become. According to a recent Flurry report, global smartphone adoption has exploded, growing faster than any consumer technology in history.
Connected TV grows at “breakneck pace” — rapidtvnews.com
Excerpt:
The growth rate of connected TV development is so steep that it is difficult to keep up with all the developments, let alone understand their impact, according to new research from adRise. The Connected TV Market Report reveals that the marketplace has been proliferating as OEMs, content distributors, and advertisers have made it into “one of the hottest spaces” for consumer video technology, content distribution and advertising. Basically, adRise has found that usage among all connected TV devices is increasing and, in aggregate, that this has led to a 25x growth surge among the apps.
From DSC:
This reminds me of a graphic from Mary Meeker’s 5/30/12 presentation:
…it also reminds me of a graphic I created a while back:
The financially sustainable university — from bain.com, a Bain Brief by Jeff Denneen and Tom Dretle
Excerpts (emphasis DSC):
Still, at the majority of institutions, the pace of change is slower than it needs to be. Plenty of hurdles exist, including the belief that things will return to the way they always were. (Note: They won’t.) But the biggest obstacle is more fundamental: While leaders might have a sense of what needs to be done, they may not know how to achieve the required degree of change that will allow their institution not just to survive, but also thrive with a focused strategy and a sustainable financial base.
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Too often, stakeholders believe that the current cash crunch and need for change is a temporary phenomenon that will subside as the economy continues to improve. But those who see things this way probably haven’t been exposed to the data presented here and in other reports that show convincingly that this time is different. Faculty and other key stakeholders must be shown clear and compelling facts to disprove the “return to the status quo” notion and to clarify the corresponding negative implications and consequences of inaction.
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From DSC:
I recently wrote a piece for EvoLLLution.com — a site focused on LifeLong Learning:
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Some linked up resources along these lines:
From DSC:
Whether you’re talking the corporate world or the world of higher education…in this fast-paced and increasingly technology-driven world, the role that technology plays in our organizations’ strategic plans needs to escalate. That is, if our organizations want to survive, we cannot view IT as a cost center.
Instead, we need to wake up and realize the world in which we are living in. As such, our IT groups should be playing key roles in determining new business models and helping our organizations identify new sources of income. IT is not just about infrastructure and plumbing anymore (although that’s important as well). IT should be about becoming thee key leading group on campus or in your company. No joke.
If you doubt that or don’t think your IT group has it in them, than you need to identify which other group/dept is developing the strategic plans on how to ride the enormous waves of change being caused by the Internet, shifting consumer expectations, changing methods of tech-enabled communications, and the massive convergence of the TV, telephone, computer (as well as other forces).
A poster in our shop asserts that you can either ride the waves of change or be crushed by them. Along those lines, my father-in-law wisely reminds me that it’s much easier to ride on the front side of a wave than trying to play catch up on the backside of the wave.
Excerpt from Succeeding in the New Normal (from CampusTechnology.com by Dian Schaffhauser)
As IT administrators struggle to come to terms with the new normal, one truth is becoming clear: CIOs need to change the conversation about IT on campus. First, instead of driving their beleaguered IT staffs ever harder while service levels drop, they need to reset campus expectations about what IT can realistically achieve. Second, CIOs must rebrand their own organization. They need to start taking credit for how IT saves their institutions money. In the eyes of the university, IT has to go from cost center to efficiency expert.
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“Technology people are inherently working to make things more efficient,” Carter points out. “But they do a lousy job of publicizing their results. They do a lousy job of measuring them. As we get more and more into things like performance funding, accreditation, and accountability, what you’re going to find is that IT leaders are going to have figure out a way to justify their existence, or they’re going to end up out of a job.”
From DSC:
I would argue that if IT leaders (at least those leaders who are effective in developing their organization’s strategy and who see the role of IT as different from its past roles) are going to end up out of a job, then the entire organization will end up out of jobs. No kidding. The world is changing rapidly, and people can no longer afford to view IT as simply a cost center. As Thomas Friedman recommends, “Know the world you’re living in.” As such, IT needs to be one of thee key drivers of business model change and overall strategy within your organization.
Addendum/also see:
- 61-year tenure for average firm in 1958 narrowed to 25 years in 1980—to 18 years now.
- A warning to execs: At current churn rate, 75% of the S&P 500 will be replaced by 2027.
- To survive and thrive, leaders must “create, operate and trade” their business units without losing control of their company.
- Study led by Innosight director Richard N. Foster, co-author of Creative Destruction.
