SmartTech Roundup: 2012 Predictions & Digital Reading

Happy New Year, Welcome 2012

Wow, what a year: Google got social, Netflix screwed up, Kindle lit a fire, and Steve Jobs left us.  Murdoch bought Wireless, Pearson bought Connections, America’s Choice, and China-based Global Education and Technology. Venture and M&A activity doubled (deal & dollars) from 2009 to 2011.
Now that we’ve wrapped up 2011, experts are looking to the horizon of 2012 with new predictions for what will shape the next year.  ZDnet’s Christopher Dawson was dead on with his analysis: Analytics and big data are going to take center stage, BYOD is going to be the next gen of 1:1, OER like Khan Academy are going to overshadow publishers, and the information age lies in the Internet, not libraries. Other sources say to keep your eye on Apple iPhone’s Siri technology, social networking, the mainstream expansion of cloud computing and the gamification of education.
Silicon Valley venture capitalists tell us to watch Khan Academy, Grockit, Piazza, Course Hero, Codeacademy, Skillshare and Tutorspree this year in EdTech. I’d add MIND Research Institute’s ST Math, Edmodo, and SchoolTube to that list.

Get Digital and Read

A Digital Book Reader survey indicated that “e-book readers can save 40-50% of reading time and can also overcome dyslexia problems.”
McGraw-Hill’s Connect platform is incorporating Live Ink, a cool technology that converts text into an easy to read cascading format.
This week, we also saw more discussion on the growth of smartphones and eReaders in the place of textbooks. Check back on Getting Smart tomorrow to learn 10 tips for using Amazon’s Kindle in the classroom.
Speaking of reading, IBM says they’ll be able to read your mind within 5 years using a simple brain-machine interface.  We’re even more excited that they expect that “the digital divide will be eliminated by the wide accessibility of mobile technology.”