the digital haze.

Image via Wikipedia

kindle is something i've heard of, moreso now that i'm in college, but have never really seriously looked at. for those of us who are blissfully unaware, kindle is basically an electronic device which you can download electronic "book files" onto and read, in lieu of paper publications.

novel idea. that being said, apple has already allegedly begun designing a rival product, deemed the "mediapad" by many tracking its potential development. the mediapad is pretty much a larger ipod touch, with the electronic book capacity. the screen would be larger than the kindle since and the touch screen feature would allow for the elimination of the keyboard from the device, but it would be smaller in physical size than the kindle. the only downside is that it would most likely be more expensive than the $350 kindle device.

i have to say, apple is awesome at coming up with fantastic new ideas, as well as improving upon previous media devices. smaller, more lightweight, and generally more convenient seem to be the trademarks of the apple label.

along with the new-and-improved mediapad, there has been talk about a new smaller, less expensive version of the iphone, dubbed "iphone lite", likely increasing the popularity of the already hot item. even more than this is the discussion of a possible collaboration between apple and verizon to create another version of the iphone (being sure not to break any alliances with the original host network of the iphone, at&t).

i think this would open up an entirely new and HUGE opportunity for apple. verizon is a gigantic network, and i know that i personally know more people (including myself) that have verizon than any other network. not to mention, spreading the product across two network lines would be an incredibly smart move, since it would allow people to continue their existing plan, but with a better product.

well done, apple. revolutionizing the media and technology all the time. while these products are all tentative and have yet to come to fruition, if they are released, i think they will prove to garner an enormous market. i'm pretty sure apple is set to dominate the market for a while.

Image by dave_mcmt via Flickr

this is not a joke; that's actually the name.

i was looking around for advances in technology in public schools, and i found new media high school. it's a charter school in philadelphia specializing in, what else, new media. the curriculum is based primarily around digital multimedia and project-based learning, intended to give students skills that will be of greater benefit to them in their professional lives.

their aim is to go beyond the textbook-memorization study techniques of the past and teach to students to be actively engaged in the problems they are presented with and think critically about solutions.

while it might sound simple enough, it's actually a pretty innovative form of pedagogy. i think you'd be hard-pressed to find many teachers who would be able to conform to this method, though i think it might benefit the students.

this discovery mainly made me wonder; what is the future of technology in regard to education? we already have distance-learning programs, but will there ever be a program in place for the majority of public school students to opt for such? and also, what will this mean for certain classes where experience is imperative? as an undergrad studying art education, this is a real concern. when will conveniences and "inter-connectedness" online begin to overtake the real-life interconnectedness that interaction provides?