Shift to the Future

I remember in the early 1980's working as a programmer for a Fisheries & Oceans research station writing code on VAX 11780 mini-computers and being amazed that people could use my programs on their terminals anywhere in the building and get this, at the same time!  Those were the days where we would plan and prepare for a couple of months prior to executing a Fortran compiler upgrade.  New VMS operating system upgrades might occur every couple years.  We’re talking slooow innovation cycles. Fast forward to 2019 and it’s a whole different world.  I was watching a recorded session recently about Microsoft’s Azure Cognitive services.  I’ll share one example.  Let’s say someone, maybe your boss who has privileged access to important systems, accidentally deletes a core database containing 100’s of thousands of invoice records and it turns out the backup has never worked.  Seriously, this happens.  Fortunately, there was a practice of saving PDF c...

My new iPhone and Surface laptop both provide a facial recognition (let’s call this FACE) method of identifying myself for access (logon).  I use Keeper, a password and other confidential information manager and it too leverages FACE.  When I need to log into an app or website, I am offered Keeper as a source for the username and password and when I choose that, Keeper uses my face to login and look up the app or website, and offer the credentials to fill in.  Super convenient!  FACE is or will be used to customize customer experiences. For example, you walk into your home, it welcomes you by name, adjusts the heat and lights, and perhaps it pushes your favourite digital pictures and art to the wall frames, and selects your favourite streaming station to pipe through the house A/V system.  Or, you walk into a mall, and the screens, which are everywhere by now, start presenting ads to you based on your social media behaviors and past shopping activities.  FA...

When I was a young student we had to do our school work mostly independently.  It kind-of matched to the workplace where people mostly contributed individually.  I remember in university one of my computer science professors would say “I don’t care how you get the assignments done but I will get you on the test”.  His point was that if you don’t do or understand the work that you turn in you will not be able to pass the final which was worth 50% of the grade.  I think things have changed where we value collaboration, reuse, and innovation more than just following the rules, doing it yourself, or doing it ‘my way’.  I certainly value a balance of this from those that are part of my team.  But, what do students in our schools today experience?  I was speaking with some teachers the other day and the English department head asked about using a tool Turnitin .  This tool ensures that “[s]tudent work is instantly checked for potential plagiarism usin...

I recently watched the movie Transcendence ( see trailer ).  Having read Ray Kurzweil’s The Singularity is Near a few years ago, I thought it would be cool to see a movie roughly based on similar ideas.  Note… I found the book to be interesting but disturbing, likewise the movie.  There is an internal drive within some people to pursue inventions for the sake of the science.  Unfortunately, there are consequences to new inventions that go along with the perceived benefits.  As new seemingly miraculous inventions are conceived, we should be more vigilante about asking “why”.  Why should we even try to upload a human brain or any brain, into a machine?  Why should we try to ‘live eternally’ within a machine as a digital existence?  There are scientists like Ray Kurzweil who believe it is possible and that the capability should be invented.  But should it?  Okay, back to earth… I personally don’t believe it is possible to transcend our h...

Many of us resist change.  We like our comfort zone.  However we are changing constantly as that is just part of living.  One of my co-speakers at the symposium Moving Educational Technology from Enhancement to Transformation held yesterday said that as soon as we speak, we change.  How true.  Change is inevitable so why do so many of us try to resist it? At the symposium I spoke about Transformative Change .  We crowd sourced ideas from the participants on what they can stop, continue, and start doing to increase success in shifting to majority adoption of innovations in their classroom, school, or district.  Y ou can view the audience contribution here along with my co-speakers audience feedback on What Transformation and Ecologies of Learning . Organizations and individuals have a choice to embrace change, grow, and become more than they are today.  Alternatively, they can fear and resist change and ultimately become less useful and potent...

It’s a short but profound little question, “why?”.  Why influences a persons motivation to choose one path or thing over another.  In the book “ Start with Why ” by Simon Sinek that I’m currently listening to on my commute between Vancouver and Maple Ridge, the author introduces the golden circle ( watch the TEDx video ).  So many companies and individuals are focused on what they do and how they do it but miss the mark of why they are doing it.  In his book, Simon uses an example of when MP3 players came out.  Manufacturers would talk about what these did or had such as how many gigabytes, how long the battery would last, etc.  When Apple produced the iPod, they focused on why you would want one.  They described a lifestyle, talked about why you would want 1000 songs in your pocket, etc.  Once you were hooked, you would ask about what such as how much memory.  Apple wanted to change your life as you experienced music, not just sell you a...

I am amazed how mobile computing has taken the world by storm.  It really is like a revolution.  Traditional ways of computer are being disrupted, some might suggest out of existence.  We increasingly read headlines ( here , another ) about the death or end of the desktop computer.  Actually it’s more, the death of the MP3 player, digital camera, calculator, voice recorder, handheld GPS, camcorder, to list a few other casualties.  I think this is great – fewer specific use devices to buy and haul around with you is a good thing.  Costs to own a diverse set of devices disappears into the single purpose device.  However, can the mobile device really meet all of our needs in the most effective way?  Is there still a place for “traditional” devices such as the desktop? My own experience is that I might use my home desktop computer an hour or two a week at most and that’s mainly for banking, some email and Facebook, maybe a bit of Twitter, and at cer...

I don’t know about you but I often wonder about the pace of invention and innovation in our world.  There are marvels being envisioned, designed, engineered, and produced all the time.  Many inventions are meant to improve our lives in some way.  While driving the country side of Germany in May , we say many wind farms.  These are pretty cool devices to see.  Harnessing wind power to generate electricity is a good use of invention to try to tackle the problem of less clean technologies that power our always on lives. As I get older, I’m looking forward to the results of research into personalized health care which might yield amazing improvements in how disease is detected and dealt with.  Imagine smart “drugs” that are actually super miniature computers, nanobots, programmed to be compatible with your DNA and once injected, rapidly seek out specific diseased cells.  Once found, the nanobots rearrange at a molecular level, the cell structure to corre...

Do you get the sense that the world has sped up?  Does time seem to be passing you by faster and faster?  Do you find that the rate of change, new products, services, and amazing capabilities is accelerating?  Well, you would not likely be alone in sensing this.  We live in unprecedented times of rapid change.  I spent a few days last week at the annual Microsoft Canadian Leadership Summit in the Microsoft Executive Briefing Centre in Redmond Washington. About 300 technology leaders from across Canada converge for an information and networking packed few days where clearly, we were treated to a drink from a fire hose, metaphorically speaking. Author Steven Johnson spoke to us about innovation based on his book “ Where Good Ideas Come From ”.  He talked about how ideas are more likely the result of a Slow Hunch than a Eureka Moment, percolating slowly over time.  Ideas often generate based on ideas mixing in ‘liquid networks’ such as coffee houses ...

A lot of people are writing and speaking about innovation these days.  I hesitated to join in but it’s been on my mind lately too so why not see if I can add to the conversation.  Wikipedia (Feb. 25, 2012) starts its article on this topic with “ Innovation is the creation of better or more effective products , processes , services , technologies , or ideas ”.  When I read about the enormous problems facing us today and into the future, I see a rising need for more innovative thinking.  The worlds problems seem overwhelming with automated work , fuel costs and scarcity, war, public and private debt loads, education systems in need of redesign, governments buried in red tape and complexity , and the list goes on.  Small thinking isn’t going to help us solve these problems but innovation can.  The environment for learning matters tremendously as the authors of A New Culture of Learning suggest “ when play happens within a medium for learning—much like a cult...

Every so often I just have to pause to contemplate the awesomeness of our world.  Technology has certainly brought the world amazing tools and services.  I’m reading an historical fiction book “The Seekers”, book #3 in an 8 book series.  The story is set in the late 1700’s, early 1800’s in the newly formed USA.  At one point a young couple migrates west down the Ohio river, acquires 20 acres, builds a crude cabin, begins to clear land, plant corn, and own a cow.  The harsh lifestyle is astonishing.  I suspect that most of us in the developed world take for granted what we have and enjoy.  Those early settlers lived on corn mush and semi-sour milk, every day, every meal.  Their cooking, bathing, clothing, labouring, entertaining capacity was very poor.  To reach the small village near the fort to trade with others, they walked four miles through harsh terrain.  At least they had ‘central heating’ for their cabin, a fireplace!  Think...

My wife and I love to go for walks in the woods, by a river, lake, or the ocean, or take our bikes for a ride in a park.  I like to get out and hike mountains (nothing too serious), and mountain bike ride deep in the woods up in the mountains.  There is something surreal about being connected to nature, away from the distractions of our smartphones, computers, tablets, TVs, and PVRs.  Actually we don’t have a PVR or cable channel package.  Good ol’ rabbit ears and a $40 digital to analogue converter gives us about 6 decent channels of digital HD for free! But I digress…  I wonder what we as a culture, a society, have lost or given up, by being so intertwined with our technology.  It has literally invaded all aspects of our lives.  You might be wondering why I, a person so passionate about, amazed by, and engaged with technology would even be thinking this way.  Well, I like to consider all angles of most topics and technology is no exception....