Misreading E-Books

The Chronicle of Higher Education reported a new study today that shows most students only saved $1 purchasing E-Textbooks when compared to those who purchased printed books.

Sadly this is the headline but isn't the important aspect of this study. After all, why shouldn't publishers expect to get paid for their work whether they deliver it on paper or via bits and bytes? We should know by now that publishing something electronically doesn't necessarily mean it's going to be less expensive.

The real question of worth is not related to the monetary cost, the question is will people use it and will it surpass the utility of simply consuming the printed word?

The Educause study from Daytona State College  reports that more than 60% of participants did not enjoy reading or referring to their text book in place of a printed book. Further, more than 65% of students felt they were less prepared for exams then they would have been if they would have had the book.

One big challenge to the Daytona State College teaching staff in this study was the fact that many of their students were not technologically savvy. This can certainly effect the results of the study. We could imagine that students with more technical skills would be more attracted to the technology and thus would have been happier reading the books online.

If you look at the results of the study, though, you see that the students did use the technology available to them and found it quite important to the success of their work in the class. About 65% of students said the applications on the netbooks they were assigned were helpful in doing the work in the class.

So the students used the technology to complete their class work but they did not enjoy reading the book electronically and they felt the screen version of the text left them less prepared than they would have been with a printed book.

Another factor in gauging the utility of E-books and E-readers is the ecological footprint of the technology versus printed books. It turns out that the environmental impact of the electronic version may by much higher than the printed version. According Raz Godelnik of EcoLibris, Apple Computer's own documentation shows that one iPad has "the carbon footprint that is equal to the footprint of about 32 paper books". Amazon.com and other E-reader sellers do not publish the eco-footprint of Kindle and other devices.

I am not suggesting that E-books and E-readers are wasteful or bad. In fact, I believe the technology of these micro devices should be important to the expansion of communication between people in the modern world. It is, in fact, the utility of the communications tools that make these devices so important, not the consumption of media. The communications tools can make them more valuable then if they are used simply as tools for media consumption.

Schools and families buying up these devices by the millions should be planning other uses beyond keeping books out of our children's backpacks. Manufacturers should be creating devices that have other tools that further the communication of ideas between people.

Making a list of applications for these devices and how you would use them in learning and communicating is a great place to start when trying to decide whether or not to introduce an iPad or Kindle to your students. Not, how many books you can pack into them.

The FBI, CIA, Social Media, and Ninja Librarians

Last month we had a small election in our County. There were two seats open on our local school board and a bond measure for our local community services agency. As always I made sure to vote. When I got home that night I posted a Facebook notice to let people know I had voted in case anyone I knew had forgotten about the election. A few minutes later a friend posted a comment after mine. When I came to the page to read the comment I noticed a couple of Facebook ads related to elections.

On the face of it, Facebook "Related Ads" seem to be quite helpful. Why wouldn't I want to know about other election information? I've just told the whole world that I'm interested in elections.

What I know is that whatever I publish on Internet is public or at least available to someone no matter what Privacy Settings Facebook or any other Internet service offers me. In a recent interview with Charlie Rose, Facebook's Mark Zuckerberg goes so far as to say that this is a good thing. Humans long for connecting with people with whom they have something in common. That's why Facebook is so successful says Zukerberg.

As we begin to use social media, and the Internet in general, more and more for publishing our political opinions and activities the Orwellian questions arise as to who knows what I'm doing and what are they doing with that information?

It turns out that a growing list of organizations have the capacity to know. Obviously Facebook knows everything you publish on their service. So do the FBI and the CIA.

In a recent NPR story, How Does the CIA Use Social Media? Robert Seigel interviews Associated Press intelligence correspondent Kimberly Dozier about the CIA's hundreds of "ninja librarians" who comb through millions of tweets and Facebook postings looking for information to provide US government policymakers. When Dozier asked the CIA about the possibility that their analysts might be following postings by American citizens she said "the CIA was very clear with me: We do not follow Americans here or overseas. That's not our purview."

Of course it is the purview of the FBI. We can be certain they are using the same methods and digital tools to conduct their investigations. And, they are likely using the same tools anyone of us can use -- Google Analytics. "Enterprise-class web analytics made smarter, friendlier and free" is the motto Google uses to describe their powerful service that analyzes web traffic.

After the 2011 popular uprisings in the Middle East, United States intelligence staff realized they could have used these tools to predict the uprising in Egypt. In a story for NPA (Google: A New Tool For US Intelligence) Army instructor Gabriel Koehler-Derrick describes how "Google Trends allows us to get a sense of atmospherics." Trying to get a pulse of the citizenry, investigators tap into what kind of information searches people are doing. What they found after the fact in Egypt was that people were following what was going on in Tunis far more than what they might typically be searching on most days.

This isn't something new. Companies have been following our purchasing trends since the advent of computers. Grocery stores have decades of purchasing data on each of us as do banks and credit card companies.

What's different is that now we are putting even more data online. It's not just our shopping habits but our vacations, our family images, our sexual and religious preferences, and our political views. The potential for government officials and investigators for misusing this information is great. Racial profiling is one example of this very difficult issue facing our country since the tragedy on September 11, 2001. Certainly our digital footprints are a big part of the process.

Because we live in a Democratic society I have faith that the power of the information flow will not only allow us to maintain our personal freedoms but also help guarantee the open, Democratic life we enjoy.

During the recent political unrest in the US the world got a window into the power of citizenry voice. A University of California, Davis student published an eight minute video of a pepper spray incident on campus. To date nearly 2.4 million people have seen this video on YouTube.

The video expanded the public dialog such that students were able to communicate their ideas on major mainstream media outlets like Fox News. Shortened versions of the video and snippets hit the mainstream media like wildfire. It went viral. More importantly, the video provides the kind of trend that even Google's electronic servers can't analyze.

Most people watch only about the first minute and a half of the video. However, about two minutes into the video you begin to hear voices in the crowd scream "shame on you!" After just a few shouts the screams turn into a chant. In the next few minutes the police begin to realize that something terrible had just happened and they start to back away. The camera follows as the crowd begins to chant in unison over and over again. The eery video appears as if the students were pushing the police away with their verbal chastising.

This event was no Kent State and the world has changed significantly since that terrible day on May 4, 1970. One result of the tragedy at Kent State was a Pulitzer Prize winning photograph of a young woman kneeling over the body of a dead student. He had just been shot and killed by the Ohio National Guard. The photo helped inspire Neil Young to write one of the most memorable songs of his long and illustrious career. It also helped galvanize a generation of Americans who stood up and helped finally end the war in Vietnam.

There is no telling what today's social media will do when it comes to changing the political landscape. Just as easily as groups use it to post information about their political views, other groups can use it to publish their own views in an attempt to squelch other movements. That sounds much like Democracy to me.

Today's young people have been born as "great communicators" and the tools available to them may expand their political base if used effectively.

Whatever happens, what we do know is that the whole world is watching. Literally.

Note to self . . . there are vans that don't have automatic doors

This afternoon I picked up my daughter and her friend Gabby at the local mall. When I dropped Gabby off at her house she got out of the van and said goodbye. Then she pulled the handle on the door and began to walk away.

But the door didn't close.

I drive a lot of kids around these days and most of them make the same mistake with our doors. It turns out we have a 12 year old van with standard doors. Most kids today are used to automatic doors.

You could say it's time for me to trade-in my van after 182,000 miles but I think we'll keep it for a few more years. Maybe I should put a sign on the door to remind kids that they need to pull on the door to close it . . .

About a year or two ago I started wondering about who was it that invented the automatic door. Why is it such a great idea? Sure busses have them but do we need them in our personal cars?

Then I thought about Thor's Wheels. This is a B.C. comic from the 1980s. Thor, who makes one wheeled vehicles, is asked if he'd ever considered a multi-wheeled vehicle. His reply shows that either he can't imagine a different type of vehicle ever becoming useful. Or, he's completely satisfied with a one wheeled vehicle.

This is the trouble with technology. We get used to it and can't imagine the need for anything else. And, we hardly have the time to go out and find something new and learn how to use it. Then someone like Steve Jobs comes up with an idea for a new technology, creates an "insanely great" product out of it, and we all want to have it.

But is that enough of a reason to go out and get it? What are we doing with the old technology we leave behind? Are we making sure it's donated to someone who will reuse it or perhaps taking it to a recycle center? Or, is it headed for a dusty spot in a back closet or the garage, or perhaps even the garbage heap?

The scariest part of this story for me is what we are teaching ourselves and our younger generations. Most of my daughters friends are very sweet and I'm sure they don't judge me harshly for having to manually close the doors in my van. But they do react in a strange way the very first time they have to close the door of my van. It's as if they just had to learn something new.

I can hear their internal brain talking to them at that very moment: "Note to self . . . there are vans that don't have automatic doors. Back in the old days you had to close them manually using your physical strength."

I think I'll keep my van for a few more years. I just hope my daughter's friends don't think I'm some grouchy old man barking at them to close the door properly.

When I do get another vehicle it will probably not be a van. By then I hope to be done with this taxi cab driving lifestyle and I can get something smaller and more sustainable. It won't have automatic doors. Or will it? It probably won't have a key and a number of other "features" I can't even imagine. It might actually drive itself.

Sometimes I feel just like Thor. Sometimes I feel so last week.

Can Gaming Save Education?

I attended a presentation this week at the Marin County Office of Education with James Paul Gee, author of What Video Games Have to Teach Us About Learning and Literacy. Gee's thesis is about the positive aspects of gaming and why we should use video games in education.


He says we can use games to help people (young and old) learn teamwork, how to work on projects, and how to be learners who voluntarily seek out information in creative fashion.


Gee also describes how in education today we "punish" students who get it wrong with bad grades which tends to make them feel as if they are failing, while in gaming failure can be a positive process that helps us learn from our mistakes and get one step closer to success, the next level of the game, and our ultimate goal of completing (or winning) the game. 


He also points out that this process of coming back from failure and striving for success helps make gamers more resilient and that resiliency is key to becoming a good learner and a successful person in today's competitive world.


These are all noble and important ideas which I believe are generally true. His examples from World of Warcraft and other games make sense.  However, I believe Gee puts too much emphasis on the tech piece of the learning process.


At the end of his talk Gee left us with a slide that said "Teachers as Creators." The idea he wanted us to take away is that it's time for teachers to become creators of games that can teach students what they need to know in the process of playing the game. After all, if the people who built World of WarCraft can do this so successfully, why can't our teachers do the same in education?


To me this is the same argument we've heard for decades. The problem is defined as education is failing and the proof is that students are dropping out, or worse, sliding through without learning anything. Students are arriving at college without basic writing skills necessary to succeed at this higher level.


The system needs reform and why not turn it all into a computer game? We've shown how playing games helps people learn, this should be easy to do in schools. Right?


When I asked him about this one on one Gee said he also believes the transition to a gaming emphasis in education should be lead by the techies and not educators despite the fact that he spent a good deal of time in his talk praising teachers and lamenting how government programs like No Child Left Behind have destroyed teaching and teachers role in education. 


In fact, I asked him if he had read Douglas Rushkoff's recent book "Program or Be Programmed" which suggests that people (such as teachers) need to learn how to create and manage the technology in our lives or risk being controlled by the programs that run our social, economic, and information systems. Gee scoffed and described Rushkoff as someone who says anything he thinks will help him sell books. 


The truth is that Rushkoff has gone away from some of his earlier ideas promoting and evangelizing the positives of technology in life and has begun to question what it's doing to our society and our kids in particular. In my view this is essentially opposite to what Gee is saying about using gaming in education. For Gee it's all about putting gaming (technology) into learning.


Ironically Gee kept saying in his presentation how it isn't an either/or proposition. This is the one point I left thinking about the most. Teachers use project based learning extensively. This aspect in teaching has grown significantly for at least two decades with the help of organizations such as CUE, ISTE, GLEF, and BIE and many more.


Schools have successfully integrated technology into the learning space on a massive scale and teachers are becoming more and more skilled at involving technology in their curriculum.


Teachers are creative learners who strive to make sure their classes are fun and interesting so that their students leave with a sense of the importance of being a life long learner. Education is filled with opportunities for students to learn teamwork and become information literate.


Taking into account the ideas Gee shows us from learning through games and integrating those ideas into our curriculum makes sense. We need to learn teamwork, how to work on projects, and how to be learners who voluntarily seek out information in creative fashion. Re-tooling education to be a computer game is not the way to achieve this goal.


Education doesn't need to be saved. It needs to be nurtured and improved to meet the needs of 21st century world.

Who Will Save Us From The Future?

Who will save us from the future?

Clive Thompson writes in his column Keying In The Future Leaders in The Bohemian about how a college english student named Daniel Finnegan who invented an application for your smart phone that will automatically reply to a text message you receive while driving (or any other time you don't need or want to answer a text message). The application will explain that you are driving and will reply as soon as you get to a safe place to send a text message.

Thompson uses Finnegan as an example of how modern computer programming allows even non-computer geeks to build apps that will support and improve human existence. Finnegan used a new Google tool called App Inventor which allows for graphical "programming" of the system and features of your smart phone.

He further cites Douglas Rushkoff's recent treatise "Program Or Be Programmed" as evidence of the importance of this new way of using technology to improve our lives.

Rushkoff explains - "That's right: America, the country that once put men on the moon, is now falling behind most developed and many developing nations in computer education. We do not teach programming in most public schools. Instead of teaching programming most schools with computer literacy curriculums teach programs. Kids learn how to use popular spreadsheet, word processing, and browsing software so that they can operate effectively in the high-tech workplace. These basic skills may make them more employable for the entry level cubicle jobs of today, but they will not help them adapt to the technologies of tomorrow."

Rushkoff and Thompson make a good point about the basic understanding most people have of technology and it's use and interface within our lives. As someone who teaches people how technology can be your friend, make your life easier, help you learn and communicate with others, I see how we all need to learn more about how technology works (or doesn't work) for us.

That part I agree with. It's the part about why Finnegan decided to create his ingenious phone app that bothers me. "How do you stop people from texting while driving?" asked Thompson. It turns out that Finnegan "realized that one of the reasons people type messages while they're in the car is that they don't want to be rude -- they want to respond quickly so friends (and I assume he also meant colleagues) don't think they're being ignored."

Is it a great idea to have a app for your phone that auto replies to people when you can't get to their message as quickly as they might like? Absolutely. There are so many places where this can be useful. Is it a great idea to live in a world where people think you are rude for not immediately responding to a text. Not at all.

That's where I believe we are falling behind. To me this life of always on and always connected is turning us into rude people expecting others to do something we may, or may not, have the time or even want to do in response. What if I'm in a meeting with someone else? Is that person not deserving of my full attention? I think so and therefore wouldn't answer a phone call, E-mail, or text while meeting with them.

Recently someone arranged a meeting me and one other person. The person who arranged the meeting spent the entire time texting and writing E-mails on his phone glancing up to make a comment every once in awhile. My take away from that is whatever I had to say was not as important as whatever was coming across his phone. If that's the case, spare me the rudeness and don't meet with me. Or, better yet, don't pick up your phone and "work on it" while your supposed to be working with me.

Every so often one of my friends announces they are taking time off or even eliminating their online social networking activities because it's taken over their lives. Eventually they come back and usually with a little more balance in the amount of time they spend doing it. Integrating technology in our lives is not as easy as we might think. We often spend more time than we should with the technology that is designed to improve our lives and make it easier for us to enjoy life itself.

I'm all for democratizing the creation of technology systems and services in our lives. I'm also for having more time to be human with my family, friends, co-workers and colleagues.

I'm on vacation this week and we brought three computers with us. While on the surface that seems literally absurd to me now as I write this blog.

However, I do recognize the importance of the communication we have with the people in our world and that as long as we're not camping or literally on an island somewhere we are going to want to communicate with them.

I'm just hoping for a world where we won't be considered rude, or treated even worse, if we don't immediately reply to some form of communication in a "timely manner." I believe this is where education comes in to play. We need to integrate the technology in our world but we need to do so in a manner that is reasonable and that there are shared expectations regarding when and how we communicate with each other.

All The News Isn't Much Fit to Print Anymore

During my recent trip to Detroit I passed by the former home of the Detroit Free Press. Like so many other buildings in Detroit this one was boarded up thanks to the decline in the economy.

Raise your hand if you still read a newspaper . . . I didn't think so. It should be no surprise for people to learn about the continued shrinkage in media outlets. Despite the big business that is the broadcast and publishing media industry the news and information component of this important sector of our society is sadly disappearing.

Advertising continues to be the major income for news outlets but this is a diminishing world for publishers. Revenue for American newspapers fell 6.3 percent in 2010 as compared with the previous year which was the worst on record according to the Newspaper Association of America. This occurred in a time when overall advertising increased especially in Television which went up by more than 10 percent last year.

As a sign of the times, the New York Times recently announced fees for readers of their online edition. With the overall decline in ad revenues for the print and electronic versions of newspapers, the Times decided it needed to charge fees for web readers to view their content.

In his presentation to employees about the fees, NY Times Chairman Arthur Sulzberger Jr. called the move an investment in the future of the company and the overall existence of journalism itself. "It will allow us to develop new sources of revenue to support the continuation of our journalistic mission and digital innovation."

Matt Smith, columnist with SF Weekly wrote this week about the massive reduction in the number of people in the bay area working at newspapers. According to Smith, Bay Area newspapers cut almost 50 percent of their staff between 2001 and 2010 which compares to newsroom staffs around the country that declined by just over 36 percent.

"We are the eyes and ears of our society" Smith quotes David Weir, Co-Founder of the Center for Investigative Reporting. In the same breath Weir hopes that Americans don't "decide it is better to be blind and deaf than informed."

A few years ago I wrote a short piece referring to comments by Orville Schell who talks about how America was built on the idea that the success of Democracy depends upon an informed population. My question today is are we increasingly removing ourselves from the information we need to be useful, active, and participating citizens in America today?

The Detroit Free Press is now published under a joint operating agreement with the Detroit News. Adorning the Detroit News building are these words:

"Mirror of the public mind . . . interpreter of the public intent . . . troubler of the public conscience . . . reflector of every human interest . . . friend of every righteous cause . . . encourager of every generous act"

The long running New York Times motto is "All the News That's Fit to Print." If their business revenue declines to the point where the paper is no longer viable, who will do this then?

May 1, 2011  Addendum - 
This week President Barack Obama gave a speech at the White House Correspondents Dinner in which he made the following remarks:

"You know, in the last months, we’ve seen journalists threatened, arrested, beaten, attacked, and in some cases even killed simply for doing their best to bring us the story, to give people a voice, and to hold leaders accountable. "

"And through it all, we’ve seen daring men and women risk their lives for the simple idea that no one should be silenced, and everyone deserves to know the truth."

"That’s what you do.  At your best that's what journalism is.  That’s the principle that you uphold.  It is always important, but it’s especially important in times of challenge, like the moment that America and the world is facing now. So I thank you for your service and the contributions that you make."

"And I want to close by recognizing not only your service, but also to remember those that have been lost as a consequence of the extraordinary reporting that they’ve done over recent weeks.  They help, too, to defend our freedoms and allow democracy to flourish."

GoGo Gets Me Going Online at 35,000 Feet

I am flying to Detroit on my Spring Break to do some family history research I can't do anywhere else . . . yet. I have been successful over the years in piecing together some interesting information by researching my ancestors through a variety of online resources.

I've located immigrant registration documents:

And, I recently found a list of people who received marriage certificatesin Detroit in 1923:

It truly is amazing what you can find online these days. But there are still so much data not available.

One thing I hope to find on this trip is a listing of a border crossing from Canada to the United States for my grandfather Max. I was able to locate the fact that this document exists by searching the FamilySearch.org website.

In fact, I know the name of the publication, the publication number, and the roll number of the microfiche where the document is recorded from FamilySearch.org. I am hoping I can find the actual film at the reference desk of main public library in Windsor, Ontario Canada.

What is really cracking me up at the moment, though, is the fact that I can write this blog (assuming my battery lasts) while actually flying to Detroit at 35,000 feet. As I am sure most of you jet-setters already know you can get online while flying now. Who knew?!

Flying Delta Airlines this time I decided to pay the $13/flight fee for the right to be online using the GoGo Inflight wireless service. I've tweeted, updated my Facebook, checked and replied to a few of my E-mails, and now I'm blogging.

I'm down to about 30% of my battery right now (somewhere over Iowa). I don't think I'll quite make it to Detroit which is a shame considering the little guy behind me is kicking the heck out of the back of my chair and his little brother is crying pretty loudly. Right now the Wallflowers, Bonnie Raitt, and this blog is getting me through the in-cabin turbulence.

I suppose this is a great way to make it through the 5 hour flight in the future. Of course next time I will probably be flying with all of the family and we'll need to get some sort of package deal or it's going to break the bank.

Or, maybe I won't have to fly there next time to get this information. I'll just call it up in my browser and download it straight away.

Wouldn't that be nice? Seems a bit more sustainable to me. I've got to remember to pay off some of my carbon footprint for this little journey.

For now I'm just grateful for this innovation.