Six Social Digital Trends ...

… from David Armano. Read the article this is based on here.

Six Social-Digital Trends for 2013 from David Armano

61-Year Old Digital Computer Restored and Rebooted

Amazing! From David Pescovitz … 1951 digital computer restored and rebooted:

Wolverhampton Instrument for Teaching Computation (WITCH), a 61-year-old machine that was rebooted yesterday to become "the world's oldest original working digital computer." Originally operated at the Harwell Atomic Energy Research Establishment, it was moved in 1957 to Wolverhampton's Staffordshire Technical College where it was dubbed the WITCH. There it stayed until retirement in 1973 when it became a museum display before dismantling for storage. In 2008, the National Museum of Computing in Bletchley Park began to restore the valve-laden beast.

Developing Digital Citizens

Alec Couros on Developing Digital Citizens … some really great stuff!

Developing Digital Citizens from Alec Couros

Digital Differences

Digital differences from Pew Research Center's Internet & American Life Project

Goodbye Print: E-Books Are Here to Stay

From Julie Bosman … Survey Shows Growing Strength of E-Books.

Obviously, print books are not going away. They will likely become niche' or luxury products and publishers will have opportunities to add value with packaging, high-end paper, binding, print, etc. But, much like the music and movie industries were disrupted by digital content, the publishing industry is losing to e-books. Unfortunately for most traditional publishing companies, the disruption is coming from external upstarts rather than from the incumbents themselves. Had publishers had the foresight to spin out separate digital content businesses they could have been leading this shift – instead they're watching their business model crumble around them.

E-books continued their surge in popularity last year, surpassing hardcover books and paperbacks to become the dominant format for adult fiction in 2011, according to a survey of publishers released Wednesday.

For several years, consumers have been rapidly switching from print to digital for reading novels, a sign of the growing strength of the e-book for narrative, straightforward storytelling.

Over all, digital books kept up their explosive growth in 2011, the survey confirmed. Publishers’ net revenue from sales of e-books more than doubled last year, reaching $2.07 billion, up from $869 million in 2010. E-books accounted for 15.5 percent of publishers’ revenues.

But as digital revenue grew, print sales suffered, dropping to $11.1 billion in 2011 from $12.1 billion in 2010.

The annual survey, known as BookStats, includes data from nearly 2,000 publishers of all sizes. It was conducted by two trade groups, the Book Industry Study Group and the Association of American Publishers.

Millennials Not So Tech Savvy After All?

I don't think so!

Student at Medical Stimulation Lab

Interesting piece by Brian Proffitt Millennials: They Aren’t So Tech Savvy After All. The article focuses on productivity applications and references two applications/skills in particular – spreadsheets and basic HTML coding. What's wrong with this analysis is that it focuses on old world skills. Spreadsheets? Really? Our students have a wealth of untapped skills – digital content creation (audio, video, photos), impressive search skills, crafting webpages (Tumblr and Facebook) and social networking. While I don't don't dispute that there are tech skills our students need that they don't have, I don't think it's spreadsheets and HTML coding. Instead, I think we should focus on giving them increased competency in information security, privacy, troubleshooting systems and a little bit of networking and computer repair. So let's put the spreadsheets on the shelf, tap into the digital skills our students already have, and focus on the tech skills they really need!

Conventional wisdom has it that kids and young adults now coming of age have been so steeped in everything from video games to social networking that they bring amazing new technology skills to the workforce. The truth may not be so rosy.

Even as millennials (those born and raised around the turn of the century) enter college with far more exposure to computer and mobile technology than their parents ever did, professors are increasingly finding that their students' comfort zone is often limited to social media and Internet apps that don’t do much in the way of productivity. One professor at the University of Notre Dame, for example, reports that many of his students don't even know how to navigate menus in productivity applications.

Photo by Tulane Public Relations - http://flic.kr/p/5VArws

The Problem with Analog Thinking in a Digital World

Seth Godin thinks Digital analogs are no longer sufficient. This anecdote highlights the need to re-think systems when moving from digital to analog – what works well as an analog solution may not work well as a digital system and may not take full advantage of the digital.

The parking meter was rebooting. I guess we're supposed to walk to the other end of the garage and find one that's working.

We're seeing digital awareness coming to just about everything. In this case, it was the parking meter near the library. Of course, it's not really a parking meter, it's a centralized fee collection system that saves the town a lot of money. It's easier to collect from, certainly, it doesn't waste the time of meter readers (who get alerted as to what spaces aren't paid for, as opposed to checking them all) plus it doesn't let a new parker enjoy a few minutes of the last person's payment.

...

The problem, of course, is that it's not as better as it could be. Just about every traditional non-digital solution is bounded by the limits of mechanics. Once we start connecting (and the connection revolution won't rest until it's all connected) then the problem can be reset--we can find the best solution, not a better way to solve it the old way.

Why do I have to guess how long I'm going to be parking? Why pay a penalty if I underguess, or waste community resources on patrolling for compliance?

Photo by quimby - http://flic.kr/p/8WRxjY

Re-Thinking Millennials

What a bright young woman. Really gives me hope. From Matt Silverman – Are Millennials the Most Distracted or Engaged Generation?:

Plenty has been penned on the time teenagers and young adults “waste” on the Internet. Facebook is often vilified on this account.

And while Internet addiction, bullying and diminishing attention spans are certainly of concern, the empowerment these new channels offer may outweigh the drivel. So argues Adora Svitak, the 14-year-old author, educator and speaker who recently discussed millennials and social media on stage at Mashable Connect in Orlando, Fla.

Svitak made a compelling case for social empowerment among “the generation of eye-rollers,” drawing from recent trends, studies and anecdotes from her own life growing up in the thick of a changing social landscape. Only problem is, adults can have a hard time understanding just how beneficial that engagement can be.

Your Resume, Six Seconds and Recruiters

Should we move away from paper resumes? Should LinkedIn be everyone's default resume?
From Adam Dachis ...Recruiters Only Look at Your Resume for an Average of Six Seconds and This Is What They See [Resumes]:

Many resumes end up at the bottom of the pile, and with the results of a recent study highlighted by BusinessInsider, it's no wonder: recruiters only look at your resume for an average of six seconds before making a decision about you. Here's what information they actually see.

Digital Books Taking Over

Luke Wroblewski with some interesting data on e-books … Data Monday: E-reading E-books

it's clear digital books are taking over.

• In January 2011, publishers sold 3.9 million children’s and young adults e-books. One year later, that monthly sales figure is up to 22.6 million. (source)
• Adult book sales also grew from 66.6 million e-books sold in January 2011 to 99.5 million sold in January 2012. (source)
• This past January, paperbacks outsold e-books by less than 6 million units; if e-book market growth continues, it will have far outpaced paperbacks to become the number-one category for U.S. publishers. (source)
• In mid-December 2011, 17% of American adults had reported they read an e-book in the previous year; by February, 2012, the share increased to 21%. (source)
• Ownership of e-book readers like the original Kindle and Nook jumped from 10% in December to 19% in January and ownership of tablet computers such as iPads and Kindle Fires increased from 10% in mid-December to 19% in January. (source)
• 29% of Americans age 18 and older own at least one specialized device for e-book reading – either a tablet or an e-book reader. (source)
• 30% of those who read e-content say they now spend more time reading, and owners of tablets and e-book readers particularly stand out as reading more now. (source)
• 29% of readers of e-books consume their books on their cell phones. 23% of readers of e-books consume their books on a tablet computer. (source)
• Amazon has sold over two million Kindle Singles: e-books that are shorter than full-length books but longer than most magazine articles. (source)

Digital Natives Emotionally Detached from Media

Switching between media 27 times an hour is super multi-tasking – Wow!

From T.C. Sottek Study: 'digital natives' switch devices and platforms every two minutes, lack emotional engagement

A new study revealed by Time indicates that those who grew up with mobile tech are restless and emotionally detached consumers, switching between TVs, magazines, tablets, smartphones, or channels within platforms about 27 times an hour while experiencing “fewer highs and lows of emotional response.” The study says that these “digital natives” use media to “regulate their mood,” and that as soon as they’re bored or tired, they shift their attention elsewhere. And while a cursory glance at any vacuous, smartphone-equipped person might be enough to declare the findings plausible, Time’s study appears to be more scientific: researchers used biometric monitoring and point of view video capture to monitor people’s daily media consumption habits.

 

More on Hacking Bitcoins

In Bitcoin – Hacking Digital Currency I discussed the idea of increasing the value of bitcoins by buying more, creating more or destroying other people's bitcoins.

A couple of readers (both anonymous) rightly commented:

LOL this is true of all monies and currencies and goods of any type. If some are destroyed, others are more valuable. If some are created, others are less valuable. This is supply and demand. It's not at all unique to nor a special property of Bitcoin.

and

Same could be said for any commodity. If I simply destroy the global gold reserves, my gold will skyrocket in value. It's a pretty stupid "weakness".

While this weakness is inherent in any currency, monies, goods, gold, etc – what makes this sort of hack unique is the digital nature of bitcoins. Destroying or hoarding the reserves of gold is an entirely different thing than destroying, hoarding or even creating digital currency.

 

Interesting Data on Young People and Digital Technology

From the Pew Internet Center's presentation Baby Boomers and Digital Technology:

Kids:

• more likely to have a cell phone
• less likely to have a desktop
• more likely to have laptop
• more likely to have an iPod or MP3 player
• more likely to have a game console
• more likely to have an e-reader
• lore likely to have a tablet

Baby Boomers and Digital Technology

Baby Boomers and Digital Technology

View more presentations from Pew Research Center's Internet & American Life Project

(7) Baby Boomers and Digital Technology:

Director Lee Rainie will dicuss how Baby Boomers use technology at the What’s Next Boomer Business Summit. He’ll explore generational differences in use of the internet and mobile devices and how coming developments in technology might affect their activities and attitudes.

Bitcoin – Hacking Digital Currency

Jon Callas identifies a potential weaknesses in a digital currency system such as bitcoin – [cryptography] Bitcoin observation:

I was sitting around the other weekend with some friends and we were talking about Bitcoin, and gossiping furiously about it. While we were doing so, an interesting property came up.

Did you know that if a Bitcoin is destroyed, then the value of all the other Bitcoins goes up slightly? That's incredible. It's amazing and leads to some emergent properties.

If you have a bunch of Bitcoins and you want to increase your worth, you can do this by one of three ways:

1. Create more Bitcoins.
2. Buy up more Bitcoins, with the end state of that strategy being that you've cornered the market.
3. Destroy other people's Bitcoins. The end state of that is also that you've cornered the market.

(Via Bruce Schneier)

 

Sweden, Cash, Digital Money, and ...

ABBA? Yes, ABBA

Malin Rising observes that In Sweden, Cash Is King No More:

Sweden was the first European country to introduce bank notes in 1661. Now it's come farther than most on the path toward getting rid of them.

"I can't see why we should be printing bank notes at all anymore," says Bjoern Ulvaeus, former member of 1970's pop group ABBA, and a vocal proponent for a world without cash.

The contours of such a society are starting to take shape in this high-tech nation, frustrating those who prefer coins and bills over digital money.

In most Swedish cities, public buses don't accept cash; tickets are prepaid or purchased with a cell phone text message. A small but growing number of businesses only take cards, and some bank offices – which make money on electronic transactions – have stopped handling cash altogether.

"There are towns where it isn't at all possible anymore to enter a bank and use cash," complains Curt Persson, chairman of Sweden's National Pensioners' Organization.

He says that's a problem for elderly people in rural areas who don't have credit cards or don't know how to use them to withdraw cash.

The decline of cash is noticeable even in houses of worship, like the Carl Gustaf Church in Karlshamn, southern Sweden, where Vicar Johan Tyrberg recently installed a card reader to make it easier for worshippers to make offerings.

 

Digital Natives Not So Good Face-to-Face

Not so surprising, but I'm not so sure it's a re-wiring of the brain. Like any skill, if you don't practice face-to-face interaction your abilities will not improve and any existing skills you have will likely atrophy. I, myself, long for a future with no human interaction, but it would probably be tough to continue my teaching career;)

John K. Mullen reporting …Digital Natives Are Slow to Pick Up Nonverbal Cues:

If you're a digital native, you should be aware that the internet may have partially rewired your brain in such a way that when you meet people face to face, you're less capable of figuring out what they're thinking.

No, I'm not joking. There's a significant amount of scientific literature on this. Compared with people who didn't grow up using computers and the internet, you may be slower to pick up on nonverbal cues such as facial expressions, tones of voice, and body language.

 

What Happens to Our Digital Data?

A third party owning nearly 4 years of your life - scary!

Network from Michael Rigley on Vimeo.

(Via vanderwal's brain bits on Tumblr)

Towards Digital Fluency

Great presentation from Alec Couros!

Towards Digital Fluency

View more presentations from Alec Couros

How to Prevent Cheating?

Apparently, some think digital DNA is the answer … 'Digital DNA' May Soon Be Required To Take SAT And ACT Exams:

Inside the applied DNA sciences lab at Stony Brook University researchers are hard at work inventing and perfecting a system that can prevent cheating on SAT and ACT exams.

“A novel system that’s absolutely unbreakable for securing the identity of a student taking the SAT exam,” said Dr. James Hayward.

The foolproof ID plan and others will be presented to lawmakers, who have pledged to parents, teachers and students that they will work together to protect exam integrity, hold cheaters responsible and fix the fraud, following the shocking scandal that spread from Great Neck North High School to include some 30 test takers and test payers faking their own identities, hoping to buy their into top scores and top schools.