CES made a MESS

 This week the Consumer Electronics Show (CES) took place in Las Vegas.  While I was unable to attend (despite my begging!), I have been able to follow the progress, as virtually no tech blogger or podcaster has talked about anything else.

Though not specifically targeted toward education, this show can reflect changing realities of our lives, and these trends will change our future students.  So school planners need to keep fingers on the CES pulse (to be fair, CES doesn’t always hit the mark, last year the most heralded device was the Palm Pre, a lovely idea that was DOA by the time it rolled out).

So the cliffnotes version of CES this year had two main themes, 3D and Tablet machines.

I’ll deal briefly with 3D.  I don’t see this as having any effect on classroom instruction for years.  Although the potential of interacting with virtual realities is intriguing, widespread availability of these tools for schools seems at least a decade away.  3D television, whether it catches on or not (and I don’t think it will), seems to be an entertainment gimmick, not an educational frontier.

The tablet, however, is a tool indirectly gunning for the educational market.  There really is nothing new to this device.  Earlier prototypes  have existed for over a decade, most famously the Apple Newton, and products that have come to market have been near universal failures.  These newer tablets (I am speaking of the products I have seen and not the rumored Apple tablet which may be made of pixie dust and the dreams of little children) are smaller, lighter, and more powerful.  They seem to be a great possibility for school use joining ebooks and netbooks as solutions for content delivery.  So why am I not smiling?

There is a pattern in the history of tech development and adoption that when you have two or more products competing for the same space, this can delay rather than speed the adoption of either.  A perfect example of this is high definition video players.  The HD and BlueRay formats battled for more than a year before BlueRay finally emerged as dominant.  Yet looking sales during this time showed people staying away from the purchase of either format.  In fact, by the time that a single format emerged, much of the public had convinced itself that they didn’t want it, and online streaming video (even in high definition) had more time to catch up.  Though current BlueRay sales are better, they still lag behind the sales of conventional DVDs.  Two products competing for the same space slowed progress.

In the same way I see upcoming battles in the “second device” space.  Netbooks, e-readers, tablets (and smartphones) are probably not replacements for a desktop or a full laptop, but they have amazing functionality as a flexible mobile platform.  Unfortunately, most people won’t want to purchase or carry more than one.  Each will have advocates and critics, and schools will be fearful of moving in a dead-end direction.

I’d be interested if you see a similar challenge, or if I am making problems where there are none.

BTW, we are going full-speed ahead with out netbook plan…tablets be damned!