What the pioneers of computing can teach us about the future of education

We live in a world full of technology, a world constantly changing, where information travels at the speed of light and knowledge is but a click away. I don't know about you, but I can't shake the feeling we are living in the future.

Today your phone has more computing power than global super powers had access to less than half a century ago. In the developed world and much of the developing world we have passed the tipping point, computers are now ubiquitous and there is no turning back.

And yet despite the amazing advances in technology that each decade has brought we are yet to realise the full vision of the pioneers who started all this. The area which has the biggest potential is education, but things are only just starting to change.

Before getting into the topic of education I want to tell the brief story of a few people who were crazy enough to think different, who imagined and in many cases invented the world in which we are living in today. By understanding their vision for the future we can see how far we have come and draw inspiration for what lies ahead.

Augmenting Human Intellect

Lets start with Douglas Engelbart, best known as the father of the mouse. Whilst impressive, this claim to fame does not do his research team justice. Way back in 1968 at the dawn of computing he worked at the Stanford Research Center for augmenting human Intellect (SRI). In the mother of all demos Douglas presented oN-Line System NLS using many of the features your computer has today. Multiple windows, networking, collaborative file editing, hypermedia, video conferencing, and yes even a mouse. While the system was crude the vision that drove the innovation was clear. Here is a quote from the 1962 paper on his research.

By "augmenting human intellect" we mean increasing the capability of a man to approach a complex problem situation, to gain comprehension to suit his particular needs, and to derive solutions to problems

We are where we are today not because a bunch of geeks were obsessed with technology for technologies sake, but because visionaries dreamed of a future in which computers would change how we learn, think, and interact with the world.

Xerox PARC

You can trace the lineage of your PC and even the iPad back to the research done at SRI. In the early 70's around about the time HP (the calculator company) was turning down one inspired employees's plans to build personal computers, Xerox (the photocopy company) was setting up a new research center called PARC and hiring many of the SRI researchers who worked on NLS.

PARC was a melting pot of ideas and that lead to many innovative technologies such as the Alto computer, advances in operating systems, ethernet, laser printers, and the first production mouse. While most of these were not a commercial success for Xerox, they did serve to inspire the next generation. A young Steve Jobs (business partner of now former HP employee Steve Wozniak) toured the facility in 1979 and then borrowed many of the ideas leading to the development of the Lisa Computer in 1983 and the Macintosh in 1984. In turn these were borrowed by Bill Gates at Microsoft and the rest, as they say, is PC history.

Dynabook

Where does the iPad fit in this story? Well take a look at this sketch.

This is a sketch of two children using their Dynabooks taken from the 1972 paper A personal computer for children of all ages by Alan Kay. Alan worked at PARC and together with Nicholas Negroponte (the One Laptop per Child guy) saw a future far beyond the Alto. As part of this research they looked at how children could learn to use a computer and imagined how this would change education. Key to making this happen would be transforming computers from big grey boxes into devices small and smart enough for children to interact naturally with. It's well worth reading the paper in full to understand quite how far ahead of the curve they were.

Four decades after Alan Kay's published his paper long time friend Steve Jobs steps out on stage and introduces the iPad changing the world for a second time. Within a couple of months my three year old son is at home with his first computer, a post PC device.

Seeing Taan pick up and interact with the iPad like a pro I can't help but marvel at Kay's vision. He believed that given the right technology, children can do a much better job teaching themselves. He was right.

A few weeks ago my son asked me how to spell "Pink Panther", slightly taken aback I asked him why? He had the YouTube app open, had gone to search, and now needed to learn how to spell in order to reach his goal of watching a fun cartoon. Typing was not going to be a problem. You don't need to force children to learn, they are naturally inquisitive and if given the means will teach themselves.

I think I was eight before I ever touched a computer and eleven before owning one; imagine how access to technology from infancy will shape our children's lives. Today we are lucky enough to have the tools; what is needed are the modern day pioneers willing to think different and put the technology to best effect to transform education.

Future of education

Ken Robinson makes a strong argument for this in his talks Do schools kill creativity? and Changing education paradigms. He points out our education system is broken, designed during the industrial revolution to produce standard workers for factories. That time has passed, we are now in the midst of an information revolution, creativity and self-learning are in high demand. It's about time our education system evolved to meet the demands of the future.

An unlikely hero who more than embodies Kay's vision is Salman Khan. A financial analyst who through his YouTube videos went from tutoring his two nephews to challenging the existing methods of education. He has now recorded over 2000 videos and runs the Khan Academy, helping kids and teachers find a more effective way of learning. He suggests that we let children learn at their own pace using online resources and that teachers monitor and step in to help where needed. Rather than sit though a one size fits all lecture in class and do homework on your own, it's better to watch a video in your bedroom and do the practical work with your peers in school. You can watch his inspiring TED video embedded below. It's worth mentioning that Bill Gates, through his foundation, is helping to fund his work.

I'm trying to do my bit, I recently joined TED-Ed a group of 10,000 of people keen on transforming education. It's too early to say where this initiative will take us but I want to help in any way I can. Last month I had the opportunity to attend Barcamp unconference in Yangon Burma where I talked about Khan Academy and distributed the videos to students, who in turn shared with their peers. It was an amazing experience. Technology and access to new ways of learning have a big potential to bring about change even in the most isolated parts of the world.

My son will be four soon, it won't be long before he is watching Khan Academy videos on his modern day Dynabook. Kids grow up fast, it is time to think differently about education and learn from the crazy ones who started all this. If we don't, our kids will grow up living in the future, being educated in the past.

Christ, it's Third Thursday again and low and behold we are scrabbling around trying to pull the newsletter together. We may look look a swan gliding serenely over the water but...

We hope you enjoy this month's Third Thursday and see you next month for Easter Eggs and Royal Weddings.

How do you make money from mobile apps? With all the hype that has surrounded Smart Phone Apps in the last few years it all seems so simple. Design and build a killer app, release it to the various market places and then sit back and watch the money roll in. For some lucky punters this has been the case but the psychology and tactics for successfully making money through apps is nuanced with a few key factors to consider.

Straight Purchase

I won't linger too long on this as it is a pretty simple concept to grasp. Build an app people want, then sell it to them. A word of warning though. Unless your app generates a lot of marketing hype, favourable blog or in-store reviews or charts on the best selling lists for your category then be prepared for fairly barren sales, especially if this app is not an extension to an already established brand. Mobile users do not speculatively part with their cash unless there is some sort of validation that this is the app they are after, normally from ratings from other users. So in order to make money you better be prepared to spend some on advertising and promotion.

Additionally as competition intensifies between app developers a price war has also begun and the Average Sales Price (ASP) of apps has been steadily decreasing over time. Nobody wins in a race to the bottom though so what other options are there?

Make it free?

It does seem counter intuitive to put all of that effort and budget into a mobile app to then just give it away for free, however there are still some benefits to doing this. Apps are frequently bolt ons to existing web services that make it easier for mobile users to access and consume. There is a school of thought that people will start to access the web purely through apps rather than directly through the browser as the quantity of content and noise proliferates users will want some form of filter to it all. There are more than 200 million (of the 600 million total) active users accessing facebook through mobile devices and those that use facebook on their mobile are twice as active as non-mobile users.

So a mobile app is a natural addition to your existing web presence if you want to keep your user base engaged and active. Unsurprisingly free apps also get downloaded a lot more than paid ones, especially on the Android platform so you could also consider this an exercise in brand building as well as facilitating user consumption.

Ad Supported

Including adverts in your app seems like a pretty simple revenue model. There are established Ad platforms such as AdMob (owned by Google), iAd (Apple's own advertising platform) and InMobi which dominates the Asia-Pacific market. However the revenue cuts are not great and in order to really sustain a decent income you need to have a lot of active users for your app. There is no real harm in supporting your free app with Ads aside from a bit of user distraction and the fact they may well click off your App completely if lured in by the marketing (although iAd has the benefit of being completely in app). You could also consider offering a premium service that removes the Ads which your most engaged users will want to take up.

In-app Billing

In-app billing has long been lauded as the answer to the free versus paid debate. Essentially the download of the app is free (which helps maximises the potential user base) and then the app either becomes chargeable for certain features or content. This way users get to try the app out without cost and if they like it can pay for more. It is essential to provide just enough functionality in the demo version to entice the user to try it and then advertise just how much more the user will get when they upgrade to the full version.

Sounds great! But take up of this option has been very slow so far. Bango reported that a mere 5% of the sales it facilitated in 2010 used this method however they also forecast that by the end of 2011 In-app billing will account for 30% of mobile payments as technical limitations that have encumbered developers are gradually resolved.

In-app purchase falls broadly into two camps:

1. Unlocking content and features in the classic upgrade model from a light version.
2. Building in micro transactions to buy things like digital goods in a game. For example a new bird charcater in Angry Birds or a facebook badge.

Subscription (The Holy Grail)

Marketers often cite subscribed users as the most attractive as income is predictable and regular (although naturally there is attrition). Each user that comes on board adds to the bottom line created by the previous. The sales cycle is gradually upward rather than peaking and troughing.

Not all apps can warrant a subscription model but if your app provides an ongoing level of service or is a source of valuable fresh content then it should be on your radar. I have heard anecdotally that users are also more open to it rather than a high one off purchase as they feel they can leave at any time and might not spend as much even though they normally end up spending more.

In February Apple and Google raised the stakes by announcing two different “one-click subscription models”, with the key difference being the amount each party will get for each subscription sold. Apple will get 30% for each subscription sold. By contrast, Google's “One Pass” system is a flat 10% charge (i.e., the publisher keeps 90%).

Previously subscriptions were handled externally to the app through a web interface but the ability to do this easily in-app is potentially huge. However the heavy cut that Apple have demanded has prompted a lot of unrest as the 30% cut eclipses many profit margins and Apple have said that there cannot be any "Apple Tax" (where users subscribing through their platform get charged more than anywhere else). This effectively stifles the competition unless there is a complete withdrawal from the App Store. Additionally the subscribing user's data is not released back to the publisher in the same way it would had they signed up direct. That argument needs more time to full play out.

Despite the negative issues Apple now offers an operating system that controls over 100 million high-value consumer accounts all connected to credit cards. Google and Microsoft are also both investing enormous resources in this area as well and are showing more willingness to be flexible to both publishers and advertisers.

The only downside is that users are only happy to manage around 6 subscriptions at any one time so get in quick before the gold rush!

Either way now might be the time to start thinking of your future app business model.

“In 2011, content strategy will be bigger than social media”. So declared Kristina Halvorson in her keynote at last Spring’s Content Strategy Forum in Paris.

And what a difference a year makes. At last week’s Digital Cream event, Sticky Content moderated 6 tables made up of over 60 senior UK digital professionals eager to get them some content strategy.

Here’s 5 things I took away from that day:

1. Nobody knows exactly what content strategy is yet. And that’s ok. There are various definitions and processes flying around and what people consider to be the key content strategy tasks varies depending on whether they come at it from a UX, IA, marketing, development or editorial background.

Yet in general, people agree that it’s about planning for better, more effective, targeted content – meaning dedicated budgets and much earlier/more prominent consideration of how and what content is to be created and produced. And that’s a big leap forward from filling in lorem ipsum sites.

2. Some people just need to produce that PowerPoint. On the flipside, I’ve been asked a lot recently to simply produce a ‘quick PowerPoint’ outlining a content strategy for us. So it can tick a box and lie in a dark cupboard somewhere no doubt. But few organisations are agile enough to embrace content strategy overnight so in the meantime, anything that raises its profile and gets a content advocate a louder voice in an organisation has got to be a good start.

3. If you can’t sell it all in, just do something small and strategic with your content – and then publicise the uplift.

I’m giving a NN/g usability week seminar in NYC this year called ’24 quick copy fixes with high ROI’. The idea is that you do something small, inexpensive and clever with text (but it could be any kind of content) prove its worth and then stand back as you are flooded with requests to ‘do it again’. A kind of reverse engineering of content strategy, if you like.

4. We forgot what we did well in print. We all know that writing for digital requires a completely new skills set and many talented print writers come a cropper when asked to provide scannable, searchable, ecommerce copy in a specific brand tone of voice. But you tell me when any self-respecting direct marketing agency last said: ‘Yeah, well, we’re doing this mail shot. It’s purple, A4 and has a picture of a dog on it. It’s all done, we just need you to drop some text into it’.

Offline, we always started with a messaging strategy. Equally, what journalist is allowed to write whatever they like and publish it? Magazines have formats, word counts, style guides, sub editors providing QA and publishers and editors determining the balance between what readers need and advertisers want. Content strategy is a return to these disciplines that made the British press admired the world over.

5. ‘However beautiful the strategy, you should occasionally look at the results’. So said Sir Winston Churchill. There was lots of talk around the table last week about what we can put in place to measure and evolve a content strategy, so what begins as an inspirational PowerPoint begets a set of processes and internal changes which actually allow you to create more effective content ongoingly. It was generally agreed that the stronger the strategy, formats, processes, insights and guidelines, the more content creators can concentrate on execution itself and certainly most websites will be the better for it.

- Catherine Toole, CEO Sticky Content

Three months into the light-hearted rant that really grinds the gears of the people here at Codegent. This month: time.

The reason time really grinds my gears is that there is never enough of it when you need it. Take this article, I thought someone else was writing it and it turns out they didn’t so I’ve had to do it at the last minute. I wouldn’t mind, but I also have to finish a presentation that I’m giving to a client in a few hours time, sort out this month’s payroll, go through a site review, write a case study, have a think about a new idea that someone has asked me to consider, renew my car insurance…

Last year I did an analysis of my previous year’s Tweets using some tool I don’t have time to go back and find. But I remember that the word “time” was my most-used one. Ironic that I wasted time on Twitter moaning about not having enough time.

Trouble is, I think we all feel like we’re constantly chasing our tails and worry that we do some things well and ignore the rest, or do lots of things badly. It seems odd to me that somehow the requisite amount of time for doing work is 5 days per week of 9am – 5pm and anything less means you haven’t got enough to do and any more means you are over-worked. But who decided that? What would happen if we all only worked 2 days a week? 

Here in Codegent Towers, a few people have been using the Pomodoro Technique: sticking on headphones and setting the timer for 25 minutes of uninterrupted concentration. It works. You do a day of Pomodoro and you get into bed at night and feel like you’ve achieved masses. But you’ve also not answered your emails, not taken phone calls and ignored your colleagues. To quote John Donne “no man is an island” and human interaction is a kind of key requirement of being part of a busy agency. Yet being a continent (or whatever the opposite of an island is) takes longer. A lot longer than the sum of your list of 'To Dos" for the day.

Anyway, I’ve spent too much time on this already. Sorry it’s so brief and not particularly well thought-through, but I just didn’t have enough time. 

And that, folks, is what really grinds my gears.