Tag Archives: Google Android

Blogger (Blogspot), comment-fishing, Education, eLearning, Google, learning and teaching, linkfest, ramblings, Teaching, teaching and learning, Tech, techno enthusiasts, wishful thinking, wishlists, YouTube

Google for Educational Contexts

2 Comments

Interesting wishlist, over at tbarrett’s classroom ICT blog.

11 Google Apps Improvements for the Classroom | ICT in my Classroom.

In a way, Google is in a unique position in terms of creating the optimal set of classroom tools. And Google teams have an interest in educational projects (as made clear by Google for Educators, Google Summer of Code, Google Apps for schools…).
What seems to be missing is integration. Maybe Google is taking its time before integrating all of its services and apps. After all, the integration of Google Notebook and Google Bookmarks was fairly recent (and we can easily imagine a further integration with Google Reader). But some of us are a bit impatient. Or too enthusiastic about tools.

Because I just skimmed through the Google Chrome comicbook, I get to think that, maybe, Google is getting ready to integrate its tools in a neat way. Not specifically meant for schools but, in the end, an integrated Google platform can be developed into an education-specific set of applications.
After all, apart from Google Scholar, we’re talking about pretty much the same tools as those used outside of educational contexts.

What tools am I personally thinking about? Almost everything Google does or has done could be useful in educational contexts. From Google Apps (which includes Google Docs, Gmail, Google Sites, GTalk, Gcal…) to Google Books and Google Scholar or even Google Earth, Google Translate, and Google Maps. Not to mention OpenSocial, YouTube, Android, Blogger, Sketchup, Lively…

Not that Google’s versions of all of these tools and services are inherently more appropriate for education than those developed outside of Google. But it’s clear that Google has an edge in terms of its technology portfolio. Can’t we just imagine a new kind of Learning Management System leveraging all the neat Google technologies and using a social networking model?

Educational contexts do have some specific requirements. Despite Google’s love affair with “openness,” schools typically require protection for different types of data. Some would also say that Google’s usual advertisement-supported model may be inappropriate for learning environments. So it might be a sign that Google does understand school-focused requirements that Google Apps are ad-free for students, faculty, and staff.

Ok, I’m thinking out loud. But isn’t this what wishlists are about?

geek culture, Google, software development

Android "Sales Pitch" and "Drift-Off"

5 Comments

(Google’s Android is an open software platform to be put on cellphones next year.)

There’s something to this video. Something imilar to Steve Jobs’s alleged “Reality Distortion Field,” but possibly less connected to presentation skills or perceived charisma. Though Mike seems to be a more experienced presenter than those we see in other videos about Android, and though the presentation format is much slicker than other videos about Android, there’s something special about this video, to me.

For one thing, the content of the three “Androidology” videos are easy to understand, even for a non-developer/non-coder. Sure, you need to know some basic terms. But the broad concepts are easy to understand, at least for those who have been observing the field of technology. One interesting thing about this is that these “Androidology” videos are explicitly meant for software programmers. The “you” in this context specifically refers to would-be developers of Android applications. At the same time, these videos do a better job, IMHO, of “selling Android to tech gurus” than other Android-related videos published by Google.

Now, I do find this specific video quite interesting, and my interest has to do with a specific meaning of “sales pitch.”

I keep going back to a Wired article about the “drift-off moment” during sales pitches (or demos):

When Mann gives a demo, what he’s waiting for is what salespeople call “the drift-off moment.” The client’s eyes get gooey, and they’re staring into space. They’re not bored – they’re imagining what they could do with SurveyBuilder. All tech salespeople mention this – they’ve succeeded not when they rivet the client’s attention, but when they lose it.

I apply this to teaching when I can and I specifically talked about this during a presentation about online tools for teaching.

This video on four of Android’s APIs had this effect on me. Despite not being a developer myself, I started imagining what people could do with Android. It was just a few brief moments. But very effective.

The four APIs discussed in this video are (in presentation order):

  1. Location Manager
  2. XMPP Service
  3. Notification Manager
  4. View System (including MapView and WebView)

Mike’s concise (!) explanations on all of these are quite straightforward (though I was still unclear on XMPP and on details of the three other APIs after watching the video). Yet something “clicked” in my mind while watching this. Sure, it might just be serendipitous. But there’s something about these APIs or about the way they are described which make me daydream.

Which is exactly what the “drift-off moment” is all about.

Technorati Tags: , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MPukbH6D-lY&feature=PlayList&p=D7C64411AF40DEA5&index=2]