ghsmith76's blog

I’ve been preparing for the video storm that has been approaching our campus for a few years now. The infrastructure part has been easy, bigger Internet pipe, video servers, disk arrays, file format and player strategies. We worked out security issues with VOD content from PBS and production issues by producing Chapel Podcasts. So we know how to do it, but should IT be the leader of this video explosion?

Last week our president returned from the NCAA meetings inspired by how many institutions are using YouTube for recruiting and marketing their programs. Combine that with our interviewing for a new VP of Marketing and we have final validation that video via your website is where we need to be. Now I’m fearfully aware that IT is the only group ready to manage all of these video production and distribution issues. Something tells me that this will be just like IT driving the early web and I have a feeling I will be just as happy to turn it over to Marketing when they are ready.

George Fox University, GFU, has decided to transition the undergraduate laptop program to offer only Apple MacBooks instead of the Apple or PC choice. This decision brings our “Computers Across Curriculum, CAC, program full circle back to Apple Only. The CAC program originated 20 years ago offering a Macintosh computer to undergraduates as a marketing move financed by a tuition increase. The program has been successful on all fronts by maintaining a focus on enhancing the academic experience through technology. During the dark age of Apple educational computing 1995-98 GFU transitioned to all PC laptops. Moving to laptops was the obvious choice for our CAC program and Apple totally missed the boat on early laptop design. Then Steve Jobs came back and bet the bank on OS X and recommitted to education. And now we will move back to an Apple only offer next fall. Well, not quite that dramatic, our students will be able to run Microsoft Windows if they desire. However, we would not expect a major adoption of the Windows option since only 30% chose Windows this year.

Many people are aware that Apple is doing well and many attribute this success to the iPod. That would be true, but this success may actually be based on a major shift in the way we compute. I switched to Apple over the last year after using Microsoft since Win 3.0 days. And guess what, it was the right move. The Unix based OS X Apple computer today is a superior computing device. The bottom line is that using a fast; safe and multimedia rich computer is what we are looking for today and that is the Apple computer. Oh yes, 70% of our freshman chose for us to give them an Apple this year. The major shift I mentioned is the movement away from client based computing to entirely web based computing. This parallels the shift from software application based revenue to Internet advertising based revenue. Which side of this shift do you think Microsoft is on?

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IT management in higher education may or may not be aware of SecondLife. Basically it is the ultimate virtual playground for exploring opportunities for the classroom of the future, and SL is picking up serious momentum in our Tech Ed communities.  However, It is so much more, but this post is about helping me to digest this opportunity from a university CTO's perspective.

I believe SecondLife is important enough to justify serious research into this virtual classroom opportunity. There is something about visually experiencing the person you are communicating with that makes activity like chat and IM more effective. Combine that with relatively accessible options for distributing digital content and you have access to technology that we could never justify building or buying ourselves. Work is underway by many institutions; ours included, establishing a presence in the SecondLife world. Educators like Intellagirl are becoming famous and people are building businesses and careers in this virtual world.

My advice to IT departments is for you to find out what your Tech Ed folks are doing in SL and look for ways in which you can support them.

There was a buzz at Educause surrounding the value of Google's Apps for Education vs. Microsoft's Live offering. These opportunities offer great value and I would love to outsource all of my communication to one of these services. But I can't do that. I am responsible for the privacy of required communication services such as email and calendar. I can't rationalize that Google or Microsoft would never take advantage of their control. However, services that are more voluntary such as messenger or shared spaces do justify investigation. I think the big news is the anticipated arrival of Google Docs to compliment Google Spreadsheets. Most of the competition appears to be about capturing communication of the web community for online advertising and data mining. But the real revolution may be the end of the client based office services. Google's online word processor and spreadsheet is good enough for 99% of that market. And the only defense offered for why you still need MS Office is PowerPoint. Not...Google Pages is probably a more relevant presentation application in today's web centric world.

We are moving forward with new video distribution services and the technology price has dropped dramatically since we began the process. With the money we saved I can now afford to buy more content, specifically I have been asked to acquire some cable TV channels to multicast on campus. Great, if I can buy 100 channels for $8 a door then I should be able to buy 5 channels for a realistic price. Wrong...but there is hope. I was encouraged to hear that Comcast has begun to discuss this new business model and they can use all the feedback they can get. I do sense that they have been caught a little offguard by the fact that consumers do have the ability to dictate product packaging. Maybe they can catch some clues from song vs. album sales. Plus I think they are still a bit surprised by the fact the college students no longer consider live TV as a priority. We just want enough channels to stay in touch and offer some educational value. Maybe they will figure out some sort of IPTV net bandwidth meter as a billing mechanism, but by then they will have lost the market. So for now we should be aware that a new market price will need to be established. How about $100 per cable channel per month per 1000 possible viewers.

Are you amazed at how fast the Digital Entertainment landscape is changing and how much it is could influence Higher Education? A year ago I’m interested in exploring video streaming in order to solve needs such as making our chapel video accessible or looking for some options for providing entertainment to our students since we don’t have acceptable TV access. Today I am amazed at the affordability and flexibility for doing about anything you want with video as long as your network infrastructure can support it.

Take IPTV for example, last year I almost allowed Comcast to wire my residence halls with coax in order to setup a cable TV service priced per semester per door. Today I can distribute cable TV via our campus network and the big question is what type of pricing structure should be created. We give every undergraduate student a laptop more then capable of serving as a TV, but TV is not that important to them. So what is it worth? This could be a lot more complicated then the legislation forcing the cable providers to offer a family viewing option.

Maybe Google is going to become my video provider, we will know a lot more by tomorrow after Google offers a keynote at the CES. Maybe the Telcos will be my provider, they talk the talk, but they are clueless about the walk. Maybe the entertainment providers such as Comcast or Time Warner will lead the way. Maybe I build my own cable TV headend. Confuse all of this with options to take care of my voice and data needs and it just really amazes me at where we are at and where we will go.