Looking forward to hearing your take-aways and observations from EDUCAUSE.

A few un-filtered reactions from day 1:

Godin's Keynote: I'm of two minds on Seth Godin's keynote, "Invisible or Remarkable?" The keynote was hugely enjoyable. Godin, if nothing else, offers all of us an example of how we should present and communicate. Lots of slides with evocative images, set to a story-telling type narrative. Godin compared higher ed to the music industry, making the point that today lots of artists record songs and people go to concerts, but the music publishers and record stores have been disrupted and destroyed. Higher ed, like the music industry, was a "perfect" business for many years, and like the music industry the "higher ed industrial complex" will eventually be eliminated, to be replaced with the "impossible." All good stuff, but I always come away from Godin's books and speeches with the feeling that there is less to message than meets at the eye. I would have liked Godin to do some serious homework on higher ed and educational technology, and focus his thinking around the debates and discussions we have each day. What did you think of Godin's keynote?

The Exhibit Hall: With over 260 companies giving demos and showing off their products and solutions, the Exhibit Hall is intense, jam packed and exciting. I could spend the whole EDUCAUSE conference at the Exhibit Hall, and still not learn everything there is to learn about the ed tech ecosystem. My only complaint about the Exhibit Hall is the, at times, overly solicitous folks working the booths. I would rather approach a vendor representative and let them know if I have a question or would like to try something out, rather than be approached as I look at the booth. Many times I'm in the info gathering mode, and am not ready to have a conversation. I'm sure that there exists an optimal etiquette for company reps at booths that is friendly and welcoming, but does not encroach on the attendee who may not want to engage quite yet. Most have not found this optimum balance. Does this mirror your experience, or am I just too anti-social?

Blackboard and Pearson's OpenClass: We could say lots about Blackboard and Pearson's OpenClass, the two LMS vendors that so far have captured most of my attention (I plan to expand my LMS scope on day 2). In meeting with Blackboard, I have to say that a major positive is that the company is run by experienced, calm, no-nonsense professionals. Ray Henderson and his team give me confidence that the company, or at least the Learn division that I know best, is well run. On the Pearson OpenClass side, I remain excited about the potential for a free, cloud-based LMS. However, I remain cautious and guarded in my enthusiasm for OpenClass, as I worry that Pearson is in danger of over-promising on the comparative benefits of the platform, and over-selling the impact that it will have. Perhaps I would have felt better if Pearson had broken the OpenClass division out-of the Pearson team, analogous to what Microsoft did with the X-Box group. I do think that OpenClass is a very good thing for our industry, and will push the other LMS providers in terms of service, features and price - and I hope that Pearson proves my skepticism unwarranted. Thoughts?

Microsoft: The only thing I want to say about Microsoft is to express the hope the EDUCAUSE 2012 includes an XBOX 360 team showing off next generation immersive education games and apps. Microsoft has the potential to disrupt learning from the gaming side, and I hope that the company invests the necessary resources and passion to meet the potential of gaming in education.

EDUCAUSE is the most intense (and wonderful) few days that I could imagine in our business. It is a privilege to be here in Philadelphia with so many passionate and smart educators (from schools to companies).

What are your EDUCAUSE take-aways so far?

This is an important EDUCAUSE for Blackboard. Many of us will be taking a hard look at the company, the roadmap, and the competition. Casey Green reports that "…almost three-fourths (73.4 percent) of the campuses participating in the 2010 Campus Computing Survey report their institutions are “reviewing options for the campus standard LMS” in response to budget pressures, up from 68.5 percent in fall 2009."

Are you a Blackboard school that would be among those "reviewing options"?

3 Questions for Blackboard:

Why Stay?

I'd like to hear Blackboard address the "why stay?" question directly and simply. Be willing to do the research on the competition and talk honestly about the pros and cons of staying with Blackboard. Be confident enough to enumerate positives as well as negatives in staying, and to give the competition its due when it is doing things that Blackboard should be doing. Be open and confident about where Blackboard is a solution that is working really well, and where changes need to occur.

What Needs to Change?

I don't think there is a consensus among Blackboard customers about what needs to be done better and what needs to change. Some of us would prefer investments in the core Blackboard Learn platform (better Discussion Boards and Assessments etc.). Others would like to see improvements in the other platforms, from synchronous learning (Collaborate) to mobile learning. Perhaps other customers are most concerned about support, stability, and performance of existing products. And still others are looking to Blackboard Analytics to increase retention and achieve better learning outcomes. Can Blackboard make a credible and believable survey of what the market is asking, and then report back to the community about where future investments will be directed?

What is the Plan?

Having identified both the strengths of the Blackboard ecosystem, and what will be changing / evolving going forward, we will next want to understand how the company plans to execute. How much will be invested? Who are the engineers and developers working on the products? What is the product roadmap? Letting us know parts of the platforms that are not set to change is as important as letting us know what will be changing.

What are you looking to learn from Blackboard at EDUCAUSE?

Before we get to OpenClass, and my re-posting Senior Pearson VP Adrian Sannier's answers about our IHE community OpenClass questions, a quick note about the potential for this sort of dialogue. Inside Higher Ed has given us all this huge gift of aggregating a passionate community, providing high quality reporting and analysis that allows us to have an informed conversation, and of opening up a platform in which we can have an open and sustained dialogue.

One of the reasons I'm re-posting Sannier's comments is to highlight how rare it still is for our community to speak to each other directly and publicly, across the lines of university and company.

All of us participating in this IHE community need to learn to see each other, and speak to each other, as colleagues and fellow educators - regardless of whether or not we happen to work for a non-profit or a for-profit, a school or a company. We also need to find ways of facilitating and encouraging more of our corporate/for-profit colleagues to follow Sannier's lead - to quickly and openly enter debates and discussions with less regard for "messaging" or "marketing" strategy.

Participation in this sort of discussion might come more easily to Dr. Sannier, a 1988 Michigan State PhD, Professor of Computing Studies at Arizona State University and former CIO. Pearson is in fact hugely fortunate to have Adrian on its senior leadership team, as his commitment, knowledge and reputation gives OpenClass a much higher degree of initial credibility. I do not believe that Adrian Sannier would get behind OpenClass unless he truly believed in its potential to disrupt and improve higher ed, and I think we should listen (perhaps critically and with lots of questions and arguments) to what he has to say.

Okay…on to the questions (from the IHE community) and Sannier's answers on OpenClass. Where do you want to push back? Where are his answers incomplete or unsatisfying? What else do we need to know about OpenClass?

QUESTION 1: What kind of technical and instructional support will be provided with OpenClass?

ANSWER: OpenClass is designed to be a self-service learning environment with a robust knowledge base, support forums and instructional videos. Of course, we know that self-service isn’t the right solution for everyone – so there are also a variety of custom options available to deliver 24/7 email, phone and chat support to administrators, professor and students.

QUESTION 2: What programmatic options do schools have to integrate OpenClass with our student information systems, portal systems, custom authentication systems, and other enterprise systems?

ANSWER: We are committed to providing a platform that is open to integration at many levels – including student information systems, content solutions and third party learning applications. To us, this means a focus on industry standards (IMS, SCORM, etc.) and delivery of a diverse set of tools that promote the extension OpenClass by our educational and technology partners. Watch for these solutions (and many more) with the release of the OpenClass API Program later this year.

QUESTION 3: Why would a company that sells two platforms - Pearson Learning Studio (powered by eCollege) and Fronter - offer a competitive platform (or is it a much lesser capable and feature rich version) for free?

ANSWER: Pearson LearningStudio and OpenClass serve different markets. Pearson LearningStudio is the de-factor standard for fully online programs at scale, allowing programs a great deal of control over the academic experience. By contrast, OpenClass is designed for the campus market, where curriculum decisions are made one professor at a time. We understand the needs of these markets are quite distinct and have made OpenClass with that in mind.

We recognize that there is more than one set of institutional requirements around the world for a LMS. OpenClass complements Pearson’s other platform offerings very effectively.

QUESTION 4: What granular customization controls will the institution, the faculty and the OpenClass end-user have to configure it as a campus-wide service, giving instructors and end-users ample room for personalization, sharing and openness, while preserving student privacy, intellectual property, copyright and institutional policies?

ANSWER: In many ways, we have patterned the OpenClass offering to match the Google Apps for Education model. Like GAE, OpenClass allows campuses to brand and restyle their OpenClass experience. Features that are clear improvements to the platform will be made immediately to take advantage of the speed that cloud development affords. Significant feature changes, or the implementation of new features, will be released in tandem with their “classic” behavior to allow users to choose their preference. New capabilities will be offered on an opt-in basis for campuses to allow them to manage their change processes. And, all participants in OpenClass have access to a set of privacy tools that control display of their personal profile and online status.

QUESTION 5: Free-hosting sounds great, but at what price? What sorts of idiosyncrasies and limitations will this cloud-based LMS have?

ANSWER: Again, we’ve patterned the OpenClass offering to match the Google Apps for Education model. Beyond that, we have some flexibility in our hosting strategy that we will use to adapt to the requirements of our early partners to ensure OpenClass is attractive to a broad swath of institutions.

QUESTION 6: Where is OpenClass' service level agreement?

ANSWER: We will provide a level of service consistent with the high level of service that we provide on all of our other SaaS applications. If additional service levels (whether guarantees or help desk or technical services) beyond what is offered with OpenClass are required by an institution those will be made available on a commercial basis.

QUESTION 7: Do we have back-end access to our institutional OpenClass system and data?

ANSWER: Yes, institutions will have access to a rich data set within OpenClass at no cost. They will also be able to access for fee services from Pearson for expert analytics consulting and data analysis tools.

QUESTION 8: Will Pearson provide independent instances of OpenClass for each college and university? Joined tenancy SaaS are absurd, even when free, we need a private cloud.

ANSWER: OpenClass is offered as a single instance, multi-tenancy solution. We have considerable experience running these types of environments scaled to millions of students, and have an excellent security and privacy record. We believe in the power and efficiency of cloud delivery as we use with most of our other products and platforms, and as is used by Google, Amazon, SalesForce and other leading companies.

QUESTION 10: Our institutions must retain full say on how and when our LMS is upgraded and outfitted with new features and services (or not). Will we have full SysAdmin control?

ANSWER: We believe there are many institutions that find LMS upgrades disruptive, unproductive nuisances, and far from seeking control, would love to see them never occur again. As a cloud based offering, OpenClass has the ability to evolve rapidly and incrementally – without the need for large-scale upgrades or major upheavals in user experience. With that said, we also recognize that it’s important to allow institutions and professors to have control over when and how things do change in the learning environment. For that reason, many of the updates we release in OpenClass will be done through an “opt in” process. We’ll let customers know when new features are available so they can try them out and ultimately decide when they’re ready to adopt it.

QUESTION 10: What IMS and other open standards does OpenClass support? We would need to easily ingest years’ worth of LMS course sites and educational materials.

ANSWER: We know the challenges and benefits that come with integration – and we are committed to supporting industry standards (like IMS) that make these conversations easier for us all. Today, we support import of exams via QTI and the import of course content from a variety of learning platforms. But that is just the beginning. We are also actively working toward tools that allow SIS integration via LIS 2.0, tool integration using LTI, and content import and delivery through Common Cartridge and SCORM.

QUESTION 11: We would also need an exit strategy, and be able to take our stuff with us should OpenClass become inadequate for us. Again, support for IMS open standards are key.

ANSWER: OpenClass will support standards based export.

QUESTION 12: Seamless out-of-the-box OpenClass integration with Google Apps is great, but that's already possible with Blackboard Learn and the free open-source Bboogle add-on from Northwestern, and Blackboard Learn itself is slated to have built-in Google Apps integration in 2012. What other key integrations are there?

ANSWER: We’ve built our integration through a close collaboration with Google and design partner institutions that have adopted Google Apps for Education. We invite interested institutions to take a look and see for themselves the unique approach we’ve taken and learn more about how we’re continually advancing this integration.

QUESTION 13: Blackboard Learn gives us a rather mature set of free, commercial, open-source, and built-in integration and add-ons that extent the Blackboard Learn teaching and learning environment. Third-party tools and integrations like plagiarism detection, voice tools, web conferencing systems, PhotoRosters, lecture capture systems, multiple publisher connections (not just Pearson), video distribution systems (like ShareStream and Kaltura, i.e. not just YouTube), text messaging systems, student response systems, personal learning networks, electronic portfolio systems, tutoring systems, student retention software, ad nauseam. Hundreds of LMS extensions, a smorgasbord of extensions. Many of these are also available for Desire2Learn, Moodle, Sakai and others. How can OpenClass be extended?

ANSWER: We are really excited about all the ways our partners will extend the features of OpenClass through integration. Over the next few months, we will be rolling out the OpenClass API Program. This rich set of tools and services will be available to both institutions and third parties at no cost – allowing for the rapid evolution of add on solutions available in OpenClass!

QUESTION 14: LMS mobile apps are a must, so we would assume OpenClass has them for all major mobile platforms: generic (but elegant and fluid) Mobile Web, iOS, Android, Blackberry and Windows Mobile?

ANSWER: Pearson is committed to mobile for OpenClass and to offering apps to institutions for free. In addition, we’ll be opening up our mobile API’s for intuitions to advance and customize as they choose.

QUESTION 15: Is OpenClass really meant to be an enterprise LMS? A replacement for Blackboard or Moodle or Canvas?

ANSWER: OpenClass is a full featured learning environment. However, unlike commercially driven LMSs, there are few barriers to trying it out before committing to it as a replacement for other campus systems. Since there is no money to be paid and no servers to be acquired, we expect many institutions to use OpenClass on a pilot or partial basis and then decide for themselves whether it has the features that they want for all or part of their campus.

QUESTION 16: . … the yearly licensing costs for an LMS are actually the smallest part of the investment any institution makes in our LMS deployment. Comment?

ANSWER: True. But hosting and licensing together are a considerable part of the investment, and both of these are free with OpenClass.

As of this writing, (10/16 at 1:30pm), no one from Pearson has engaged the IHE community in our discussion about OpenClass. The OpenClass website does not have a place for discussion. Steve Kolowich's 10/13 article has 15 comments and my blog post on OpenClass from 10/16 has 5. Members of the IHE community raise a number of important questions about OpenClass, questions I'd think that Pearson would want to address.

This sort of communication is critical if OpenClass is to thrive, as the marketing and sales channels that support typical higher ed enterprise purchases will not work for Pearson's OpenClass. A free, high quality LMS may be in the strategic business interest of Pearson (and Google and Microsoft.....), but the yearly licensing costs for an LMS are actually the smallest part of the investment any institution makes in our LMS deployment. A zero cost license is only one of the variables, and probably the least important variable, in our move to Google or Microsoft cloud based e-mail and calendaring. And going with Google or Microsoft is much simpler, as both of these platforms are clearly "content neutral," a claim that Pearson may make, but of which we will be skeptical.

If OpenClass is not a viable alternative to Blackboard or Moodle or D2L or Sakai or Canvas, then Pearson is not serious about this platform, and is squandering an enormous opportunity to re-invent themselves from a paper to a digital business. If OpenClass is a viable alternative, then Pearson has a long way to go in convincing us. The route to do so requires a commitment to openness, candor and transparency - and a willingness to engage in lots and lots of conversations.

Some Questions from the IHE Community on OpenClass: (Thanks Ed Garay and George Lorenzo)

1. What kind of technical and instructional support will be provided - how extensive?

2. What programmatic options do schools have to integrate OpenClass with our student information systems, portal systems, custom authentication systems, and other enterprise systems?

3. Why would a company that sells two platforms - Pearson Learning Studio (powered by eCollege) and Fronter - offer a competitive platform (or is it a much lesser capable and feature rich version) for free?

4. What granular customization controls will the institution, the faculty and the OpenClass end-user have to configure it as a campus-wide service, giving instructors and end-users ample room for personalization, sharing and openes, while preserving student privacy, intellectual property, copyright and institutional policies?

5. Free-hosting sounds great, but at what price? What sorts of idiosyncrasies and limitations will this cloud-based LMS have?

6. Where is OpenClass' service level agreement?

7. Do we have back-end access to our institutional OpenClass system and data?

8. Will Pearson provide independent instances of OpenClass for each college and university? Joined tenancy SaaS are absurd, even when free, we need a private cloud.

9. Our institutions must retain full say on how and when our LMS is upgraded and outfitted with new features and services (or not). Will we have full SysAdmin control?

10. What IMS and other open standards does OpenClass support? We would need to easily ingest years worth of LMS course sites and educational materials.

11. We would also need an exit strategy, and be able to take our stuff with us should OpenClass become inadequate for us. Again, support for IMS open standards are key.

12. Seamless out-of-the-box OpenClass integration with Google Apps is great, but that's already possible with Blackboard Learn and the free open-source Bboogle add-on from Northwestern, and Blackboard Learn itself is slated to have built-in Google Apps integration in 2012. What other key integrations are there?

13. Blackboard Learn gives us a rather mature set of free, commercial, open-source, and built-in integration and add-ons that extent the Blackboard Learn teaching and learning environment. Third-party tools and integrations like plagiarism detection, voice tools, web conferencing systems, PhotoRosters, lecture capture systems, multiple publisher connections (not just Pearson), video distribution systems (like ShareStream and Kaltura, i.e. not just YouTube), text messaging systems, student response systems, personal learning networks, electronic portfolio systems, tutoring systems, student retention software, ad nauseam. Hundreds of LMS extensions, a smorgasbord of extensions. Many of these are also available for Desire2Learn, Moodle, Sakai and others. How can OpenClass be extended?

14. LMS mobile apps are a must, so we would assume OpenClass has them for all major mobile platforms: generic (but elegant and fluid) Mobile Web, iOS, Android, Blackberry and Windows Mobile?

And I'll throw in one question:

15. Is OpenClass really meant to be an enterprise LMS? A replacement for Blackboard or Moodle or Canvas?

What questions do you have for Pearson about OpenClass?

Pearson's announcement of OpenClass, a free cloud based learning management system (LMS), will definitely change the vibe at this year's EDUCAUSE conference. I'm very curious about how much OpenClass will be discussed amongst the conference attendees, and what sort of traffic and traction that Pearson will get at its booth.

I am very excited about OpenClass, as an enterprise class free LMS has the potential to shake-up the marketplace in the way that Google accomplished with Apps for Education. I stress potential, however, as Pearson has a number of challenging tasks ahead if OpenClass is to live up to its potential to disrupt the LMS market.

4 Initial Challenges:

1 - Convince The Community That OpenClass Is Enterprise Class LMS and a True Competitor for Existing Platforms:

The entire focus of the OpenClass team should be on transparency and access. The beauty of a free offering is that the traditional sales and marketing channels and practices should not apply. There is no need to "sell" the LMS, only a need to get as many people as possible in the EDU community full access to the platform, and to share every detail about the technical specifications, cloud infrastructure, and product roadmap.

Somewhat worryingly, I'm underwhelmed by the initial communications around OpenClass. The OpenClass website is almost totally bereft of content, and sort of looks like a vintage Myspace page. I'm a big fan of Adrian Sannier, SVP of Learning Technologies at Pearson, and it is good to see his video on the site, but the rest of the content is sorely lacking. Where is the screencast walking me through OpenClass? If it is cloud based, why can't I make an account now and play like I can on Blackboard's CourseSites? Where is all the technical documentation and all the other information I'd need to start my research? How come there is no place on this site to have a conversation with the OpenClass team? Perhaps these criticisms are unfair, as I know the team had a hard deadline with EDUCAUSE to get this site up, but the results feel rushed and half-baked.

2 - Articulate The Business Model of Offering a Free LMS:

Pearson needs to be very clear and very open about why it makes business sense for them to offer a free LMS. Drop all marketing speak immediately. Be brutally honest about the threats to a publisher of the shift from paper textbooks to digital content, and the need for publishers to not lose control of the sales channel. A free LMS will always be suspect to decision makers on campuses unless we can be convinced that the provider is in the game for the long-term, and is investing enough resources in the business to ensure high levels of service, support, and robustness. We will not be convinced unless we truly believe that the free LMS is in the long term business and financial interests of the provider.

3 - Execute Flawlessly With The Initial OpenClass Pilot Participants:

OpenClass is starting with Google Apps for Education adopters. This is a good idea for a number of reasons. It limits the pool of early adopters to schools that are already forward thinking and technologically proficient, while also increasing the odds that the faculty and student experience will be better due to opportunities for integration between the platforms. But execution is everything, and delivering a premium and flawless experience to these first adopters will set the tone going forward. I hope that Pearson is investing the necessary resources to make this first group a success. (And is committed to making the whole process as transparent as the partner schools will allow).

4 - Bring Pearson OpenClass Skeptics and Critics Into an Open Conversation:

Free is a wonderful thing. Free should change the conversation. Pearson should welcome the critics and the skeptics. Everyone from the EduPunks to the diehard Moodle and Sakai evangelists. Since you are not trying to "sell" in the traditional way you can have all sorts of honest and productive conversations. Pearson does not want any school to adopt OpenClass where the fit is not good. The job of Pearson becomes figuring out how to work with colleges and universities to discover if OpenClass makes sense.

These are good conversations to have.

What do you want to know about OpenClass?

Pretend you work for Microsoft's Live@edu division.

Your job is to get institutions of higher education to adopt your cloud platform of "free hosted email, communication and collaboration services". You are going head-to-head with Google Apps for Higher Education. The stakes are high, the company that can bring today's college students into the ecosystem of web based (and mobile) services will build a long last relationship with the consumers of tomorrow.

Google is a formidable competitor. What to do? What to do?

The answer. Offer something that Google is not. Solve a problem for higher ed. Take steps to take the costs out of campus IT beyond the savings of moving to a free cloud based e-mail calendaring system. You should make the LMS (learning management system) free as well. And not just free, but integrated with your cloud based e-mail and calendaring system.

But wait you say, "we don't own an LMS". No worries.

All Microsoft needs to do is make a deal with Blackboard to pay the subscription fee for Blackboard's Managed Hosted offering for any LIve@edu customer. This is a win-win-win.

• A win for the colleges and universities, as all of a sudden the LMS subscription fees can be saved.

• A win for Blackboard, as they are guaranteed new revenues and customers, without the very expensive customer acquisition costs.

• A win for Microsoft, as they suddenly have a very good story to tell as to why Live@edu with free (integrated) hosted Blackboard is a better value proposition than Google Apps for Education.

How expensive would this be for Microsoft? Maybe not so bad. Blackboard would offer a big discount, as the marginal cost for providing another school managed hosting is low, and the high customer acquisition / retention costs would go away.

Microsoft, what do you think?

EDU decision makers - would a free hosted LMS make you look twice at Live@edu?

The news from Neftlix CEO Reed Hastings "no change: one website, one account, one password … in other words, no Qwikster."

In jettisoning the plan to create two separate (and non-communicating) sites for streaming and DVDs, Netflix has made its first smart move in many months.

What can we learn in higher ed from this Qwikster debacle and Netflix's reversal?

Lesson 1 - Admit (Quickly) When Your Are Wrong:

Hastings should be commended for reversing course. Mistakes, even big makes, are inevitable - the damage comes when we are too stubborn to admit when we are wrong. Will we be as quick as Hastings to admit when we are wrong?

Lesson 2 - Digital Economics Are Poorly Understood:

The fact that Netflix has made such a hash out of the transition from shipping DVDs to streaming content is indicative of how difficult it is to find where demand and supply meet in the digital content marketplace. There is some price point where it is worthwhile for content producers to offer the content they produce on digital platforms such as Netflix streaming, we just don't know what that price is. Nor do we understand if this price point will drive demand?

The content that we work with in higher ed offers some parallels to Netflix's entertainment content. The DVD disc, the DVD sleeve, the warehouse, the post-office … all physical envelopes and packages and transporters for the content. None of which adds much value, all of which add a great deal of costs.

In higher ed the packaging, the campus and lecture hall, does add value to the course content and the credential. Learning, unlike video watching, is social. Yet, traditional higher ed (like Netflix) must figure out ways to take costs out of the packaging in order to spend more dollars on creating the content (teaching and learning). Netflix needs to free up dollars from shipping and warehousing to pay for content licensing deals. Higher ed needs to figure out a way to lower costs so we can lower tuition and invest more resources in the learning experience.

Lesson 3 - We Will Make Similar Mistakes:

Netflix started to stumble when they moved from streaming as an "add-on" to their traditional business to streaming as a platform to re-invent their core business. The fact that Netflix has done this poorly should not obscure the fact that Netflix must accomplish this re-invention. Netflix must move from a physical goods and delivery company (DVDs, warehouses, etc.), to an information and services company. Netflix needs to make the transition to digital before someone else, like Amazon or Apple or Hulu or someone else, figures this out.

We are also at the point where some players are trying to utilize technology to fundamentally re-invent and re-engineer higher education. We know how to bolt technology on to our traditional campuses, degrees, and courses. But what mistakes will we make when we follow Netflix's path, and try to fundamentally change our business while serving our existing students, faculty, staff and alumni? Our imperative for change is not any less pressing than that felt by Netflix. I can guarantee you that we will make equally big mistakes.

EDUCAUSE 2011 in Philadelphia is a week away! Are you going? What do you want to get out of the conference? What do you hope to learn? What's on your mind?

Some things that are on my mind as I prepare for EDUCAUSE 2011:

1 - The LMS:

This could be a very interesting EDUCAUSE when it comes to the learning management system. I'll be looking to see how Blackboard is positioning itself to move from a provider of products to a provider of services and solutions. I anticipate lots of action at the Instructure Canvas booth, with many people taking a hard look at this new LMS provider. Will D2L and the Moodle vendors be able to translate their value proposition into a compelling narrative? Will new business models for the LMS spark our curiosity?

2 - Google and Microsoft:

Each year I go to EDUCAUSE hoping that this is the year that Google or Microsoft decide that this is the year that they will disrupt higher ed. Both of these companies are somewhat unique in that they have the scope, wealth, footprint and smart people necessary to make higher ed bets big enough to change the landscape. Each year I hope to meet people at Google and Microsoft who are fully and solely focused on higher education, who sit on the strategic leadership team, and who have the mandate (and an open checkbook) necessary to position themselves as education companies (the great 21st century opportunity) in the 21st century. Each year I leave disappointed. Maybe 2011 will be different.

3 - Lecture Capture:

Class capture is now standard educational procedure for medium to large lecture courses at our institutions. Providing our students with recordings of lecture classes has moved, I think, into the realm of a moral educational imperative. The benefits of being able to review lecture notes for many of our learners, and for many of our students who must miss class for athletics or illness, are too clear cut to ignore. Students expect, or should expect, that they will be able to review the lectures from medium to large classes. And lecture capture technology can power all sorts of innovations in teaching and learning, from enabling blended learning to the technologies ability to invert the classroom - with pre-recorded learning chunks that are previewed before class - making room for great class discussion and focus on difficult topics.

So this year I'll be looking to see two things: a) Which lecture capture provider seems to be consolidating its position in the marketplace (and which vendors are becoming less relevant. b) Which schools have made lecture capture ubiquitous and/or used this platform to creatively move teaching and learning forward. On the vendor side, I'm anticipating that ECHO360 will increasingly be viewed as the quality play, as adoptions for this company grow quickly. It will be interesting to see how McGraw-Hill has capitalized on the Tegrity purchase, and if Tegrity can demonstrate a clear value proposition advantage around this new ownership structure. Will Panopto evolve its business model and platform solutions to adapt to the new realities of the marketplace? Will the OpenCast products finally get any traction? And will Adobe finally realize that they need to get into this game, and try to purchase one of the lecture capture vendors who have a presence at EDUCAUSE?

4 - The Publishers:

Going into EDUCAUSE 2011 I'm more encouraged than ever before about the future of the EDU publishers. My thinking about the publishers has evolved as I've gotten to know the people who run Pearson. The EDU publishers have a limited window in which they can re-invent themselves from providers of textbooks to providers of digital services and content. The leadership at Pearson clearly understands both the opportunity and threat of an education ecosystem dominated by digital files and mobile platforms, and is determined to make the necessary investments (in both acquisitions and cultural change) to make this pivot. But the history of large companies reinventing themselves for the digital economy is not that great, with perhaps IBM being the only example that quickly comes to mind of a success. I'm hoping that the big 3 publishers announce some big moves and acquisitions and EDUCAUSE, and that the leadership of these publishers are able to articulate new business models. We shall see.

5 - Roll-Ups, Acquisitions, and Start-Ups:

I'm excited for the new Start-Up Alley on the exhibitor hall. Which start-up will catch our eye? What big acquisition announcements will be made. Last year the big news was a publisher (McGraw-Hill) buying a lecture capture provider (Tegrity). Will media management companies such as Sharestream or Ensemble be in play? It has been clear to me for a while that TechSmith and Kaltura are both essential components of a full-service educational services provider, although I have no idea if either company is interested in being acquired. Someone is going to make a good deal of money on Instructure. What company will we find at EDUCAUSE that we think is worth investing?

6 - Money:

The thread that I'm looking to make sense of at EDUCAUSE 2011 is how technology can catalyze increased revenues and drive down costs. In the sessions I'm hoping to see presenters talk about dollars and cents, how much was earned, how much was spent, and how much was saved. Give us the dollar figures. We need to get comfortable talking about money and technology in the breath, and find safe places where we can have discussions and share what we have learned. Educational technology is entering an era where improved quality is not enough. Technology needs to be the mechanism for increased productivity.

Perhaps the answer will come in bringing traditional face-to-face courses to universal blended-learning delivery, allowing for increased enrollments as we make better use of fixed (high-cost) classroom and lab spaces. Maybe the world's of executive education and online learning will come together, creating opportunities to serve new markets and bring in additional revenues. Or perhaps we will start taking advantage of the consumer technologies, technologies that have driven down the costs for tech start-ups, in our academic operations. Money, opportunities to save it and make it, will be much on my mind at EDUCAUSE 2011.

Where is your head at as you prepare for EDUCAUSE 2011?

Grand Pursuit: The Story of Economic Genius by Sylvia Nasar

One of the most important outcomes of a liberal education should be the permanent eradication of a romanticization of the past. On any measure we care to generate, from health to wealth, we are better off than at any point in history. Go back a mere 200 years and you will find a population hobbled by frequent and persistent famines, early death (with less than half of newborns surviving to age 5), early death, and almost endless agriculturally related toil.

How is it possible that in such a short time span, say since the early 19th century, that the world has become both immeasurable more wealthy and fantastically less equal? Why is it that some nations have seen exponential growth in income per capita, life expectancy and a drop in childhood mortality - where other societies persist in relative poverty and ill-health?

To answer any of these questions, we must first find an economist. Or at least someone who has absorbed the theories and ideas of the great economists.

The idea that a people or a nation could exert some control over its own economic destiny is a relatively new one, and has its origins in the 19th century economic thinkers that Nassar profiles in her gorgeous and essential new book Grand Pursuit: The Story of Economic Genius. From the 19th century thinkers such as Karl Marx and Alfred Marshall, grappling with the meaning for society that is shifting for agriculture to industry, Nassar moves on the great economic thinkers of 20th century and how they understood, (and tried to end) two world wars and a Great Depression.

Keynes and Hayek get top billing in this story, and through their lives Nassar illuminates the economic theories and policies that led to, and eventually helped end (with the help of World War II) the depression of the 1930s. The story of Keynes and Keynesian thought is well known to non-economists and economic historians, but Nassar's narrative on the impact of Hayek on our modern thinking was, for me, a revelation.

In Grand Pursuit, Nassar succeeds in elucidating the history of modern economic thought by evoking the personal contexts of the individuals from which these theories emerged. Grand Pursuit could have been subtitled: "A Biography of Economic Thought". This approach takes longer than a straightforward exposition of the major ideas of economic history, but by situating these ideas in the times they were conceived, the reader of Grand Pursuit ultimately enjoy a much richer and nuanced understanding of the ideas the continue to rule our world.

Grand Pursuit is the kind of book I think that will convince some people to go to graduate school to study economic history. That would be a fine result.

What are you reading?

Second Life has been somewhat of a higher ed bust. Yeah, I know that some of you have been using Second Life to hold some classes and teach some things, but you are in the extreme minority. For most of us, our experience in Second Life can be described as:

Step 1: Excitement about the possibilities for immersive learning and collaboration in Second Life.

Step 2: Creating a Second Life account, and finding out that we couldn't really do anything without an apparent investment of 10 billion hours or so of virtual living.

Step 3: Never logging into Second Life again.

There must be a term for a technology where the vast gap between the hype and reality causes us to lose sight of the potential of that technology in the future.

The "trough of disillusionment" in the hype cycle of Second Life should not prevent us from losing sight of the amazing educational potentials of immersive, 3D simulations in education. The necessary technology pieces are not far away. Apple's Siri technology in the iPhone 4S demonstrates the potential for natural language commands as inputs for devices and software. Haptic gloves and augmented reality 3D goggles will place our senses within the interface. Investments from gaming and computer animation will diffuse into virtual learning environments, bringing down the costs of and ease of creation to non-specialists. Hardware platforms will extend to tablets and smart phones.

In our current flat, and largely text driven, world of online education it is sometimes hard to imagine a different reality. One where we talk rather than type, and where the navigation metaphor shifts from a screen to a geography. But I can guarantee you that someone, somewhere, has a vision for the class and school of the future that looks nothing like the learning management system (LMS) of today. That digital learning world will emerge from the MMO (massively multiplayer online) game world, the gaming world, and the computer animation world.

In 20 or so years (maybe sooner - these things tend to go fast once they tip) we will look back on our current digital education tools as crude, flat, and slow.

How do we take this next step?