Blurts

I think Microsoft just announced hardware and a modified version of Windows 11 (Windows SE) to challenge Chromebooks in Education. The company was promoting Surface laptops under $250. I had read a Chromebook columnist predicting this possibility and watched the MicroSoft Education Reimagined announcement as a consequence. My wife and I serve on a community technology advisory committee for our local school district. They use chromebooks in the lower grades and Windows machines in secondary. MicroSoft at all levels could offer a more convenient approach. Is MicroSoft’s productivity suite the equivalent of Google Classroom? What about other apps designed to run in the browser. This could get interested and K12 students may benefit from the competition.

When I ask educators in classes I work with to demonstrate a technology tool they work find useful, Kahoot always seems to be one of the requests. I have explored Kahoot myself. I have worked with technology in education since this was possible and perhaps because of this personal history I find the backstory of those who have developed successful hardware and software of great interest. If you are a Kahoot user, you may find this article from CNBC describing the history of Kahoot to be of interest.

Current events and their politicized interpretations require some way for the public to process it all. Since the world is now engaged in an important conference of political leaders to address the issue of climate change. I thought I would offer this as a resource for the rest of us.

NASA offers a great online resource on Climate Change organized around the categories of Evidence, causes, effects, and solutions.

The site provides resources for educators and for kids. Politicians appear willing to ignore the issue without greater public pressure.

Zuckerberg’s surprise announcement of Facebook morphing into Meta caught many by surprise and has received a variety of reactions. It is certainly true that Facebook faces many challenges and probably deserves criticism for its indifference to the societal problems it has created. Meta and the metaverse have been interpreted by many as a crude attempt to detract from these serious issues. A few sources (CBS) have at least made an effort to put the issues of the abuse of the collection of personal data and misinformation aside and comment on the vision of a commercial metaverse.

It seems possible to argue Zuckerberg offers a vision of the future of virtual reality (VR) and augmented reality (AR). Certainly, there was a huge financial bet on this vision in the costly acquisition of Oculus. The immersive nature of Oculus offers a way to differentiate this vision from some modern reincarnation of Second Life.

I personally don’t get the social potential of VR. A better Zoom experience perhaps, but not improved avatars. I do see educational potential in VR. Think of educational VR as allowing for immersive educational simulations and you may begin to see the potential. AR is what has the most appeal for me. In imagining the future of what I described as layering, AR as layering information on life. You get a feel for the potential if you have ever used Google lens – a way to identify objects and link to information about these objects. Having this opportunity in daily life in real-time, seems doable and useful. It will take the resources of companies such as Facebook (Meta) to explore and move the field forward.

I see Mark Zuckerberg and Elon Musk in similar ways. They seem selfed absorbed and capable of generating a wake of damage, but certain accomplishments (e.g., Musk’s focus on electrical energy in transportation and advances in battery design) seem great advances for society. It is partly up to us to sort out the good from the weirdness.

Bill Gates’ book on climate change is available for download at no cost to college students for a limited time. I have read this book and I found it to be carefully researched and well written.

https://www.gatesnotes.com/Energy/How-to-Avoid-a-Climate-Disaster-giveaway?WT.mc_id=20211025060000_HTAACDgiveaway_BG-TW_&WT.tsrc=BGTW