Nicholas Negroponte‘s One Laptop Per Child (OLPC) program is off to a less than stellar beginning. The biggest hurdle (outside of Intel) is securing funds from third world countries who verbally promised to purchase units for their school children.
The organization is allowing Americans to purchase a unit for a child in a third world country — and getting an XO laptop for yourself.
Well after three weeks of questions regarding where NBC would move its digital television programs after breaking ties with Apple’s iTunes. I blogged about their greed. Well NBC Universal “announced” many popular shows would be available for free download.
But hold on. They are pulling a fast one. In attempting to fight the TiVo generation (watch TV programs when, where and how you want) NBC has decided on the following conditions on their new NBC Direct program:
Shows available for one week only following broadcast.
Playback on computer only – no transfer to mobile devices.
Commercials included: viewers cannot skip through ads.
Shows will “degrade” — become unwatchable.
Windows only support – Mac and iPod support later in 2008
So you download The Office and have only seven days to watch it before it “implodes” rendering the video useless on your computer. This seems to imply re-downloading…but maybe NBC is taking the position you have just one week to watch the show or else.
Even industry analysts are calling it a stretch. A blunder is more accurate.
But this idea actually gets “better” for consumers. At some point in 2008 (if ever) NBC will sell you the same shows without commercials and allow them to be moved to mobile devices … yea it’s called iTunes. Who is running the store over there…Jack Donaghy???
Google has now added to their on-line tools solution to include presentation software very similar to PowerPoint. This compliments their word processing and spreadsheet tools, virtually serving online version of Microsoft Office. And all you need is a Google account.
Impressed that it supports PowerPoint (.ppt) file format. You can upload an existing presentation created in Microsoft PowerPoint program and share it with a few people (in a secure environment) or choose to share it with the world (via a url) or better yet simply upload your file to SlideShare a great free site where people are sharing presentations.
What book would be a perfect follow up to The Tipping Point and Blink by Malcolm Gladwell? To prove timing is everything I read Dan and Chip Heath’s new release: Made to Stick: Why Some Ideas Survive and Others Die. The book’s authors acknowledge that their book complements Gladwell’s The Tipping Point by identifying “traits” necessary to make your ideas ‘sticky’ with your intended audience.
Written by brothers Chip and Dan Heath they share experiences and research in finding ideas that stick. Chip is professor of Stanford’s Graduate School of Business. Dan is a consultant to Duke University’s Corporate Education program.
Made to Stick provides wonderful insight to learn how powerful ideas succeed in the face of big obstacles (and people) especially in a stale environment. Take Subway’s series of commercials featuring Jared for example.
Originally passed by PR firms, Jared’s story was brought to life by the Subway store manager where Jared ate while attending Indiana University. The ad campaign was eventually created pro-bono by a firm thinking they would fail. Even Subway’s PR firm did not support this idea. Chip and Dan prove not only how wrong they were, but how powerful the idea has turned out to be for Subway.
Today’s Live Discussion at the Chronicle of Higher Education points to the growth of new technologies that will change the college campus. Gartner’s “Hype Cycle for Higher Education” focused on technologies that will transform colleges in the next 10 years: global library digitization projects, personal devices with campus network access, Internet2, e-learning repositories, quantum computing and virtual worlds.
I am very glad to see Internet2 getting more press as a key, defining technology for the future of colleges.
Tags: The Chronicle of Higher Education, Internet2, future technologies,trends