Khan Academy Launches iPhone App

The Khan Academy, which started as a way for Sal Khan to help his cousin do math homework, has blossomed into nearly 3,600 teaching videos that have been viewed more than 210 million time worldwide. Now, Khan is expanding his reach with the creation of an iPhone app for viewing the tutorials.

The new app will not allow users to download videos for offline viewing on their phones, as is the case with the iPad app already in use. However, the iPhone app will make it possible for busy students to watch the lesson while on a bus or in a car.

“This might make the app seem undercooked—and in a way it is—but it could actually be a smart move given the limited form factor,” wrote Rip Empson in his TechCrunch blog. “Stuffing the entire Khan Academy experience onto the iPhone’s screen would likely diminish the experience of its visualization tools, interactive transcriptions, and some of its better gamification and progress-tracking features.”

With an Android app to surely follow, the strategy should also expose a lot more potential learners to the Khan videos.

Datawind Builds a $20 Tablet Computer

Datawind, a British manufacturer producing wireless web-access products, has developed a new Android tablet computer that has reviewers buzzing. The Aakash 2 uses an LCD touchscreen display that can browse the web and hold up to video gaming.

By attaching a keyboard, it becomes a serviceable replacement for the traditional personal keyboard, at and a $20 per unit, it comes at a fraction of the cost.

Virtual Stores and QR Codes

This is a great video of how one retailer is taking itself to the consumer using QR codes.   The video shows people shopping while waiting for the subway in South Korea where the virtual displays and the merchandise is identical to what a customer would see in the store.  By using smartphones a shopper can scan the products QR codes and place it in the basket and the grocery bags are delivered to their home.  Essentially, for busy South Koreans, they can shop while they wait.   This is the wave of the future for virtual stores and QR codes and for retailers who are contemplating whether to open another brick and mortar they should consider following the trend being set by the most connected people in the world.

Amazon and its love of numbers

Amazon has made many moves over the past few years that have affected the publishing industry. Here is a video by Colin Robinson, a long-time editor, about how Amazon does business and its possible negative impact on publishers, authors, and readers. The article associated with this video can be found here. The article itself is an interesting read, with a focus on Amazon's love of numbers and quantitative analysis -- along with what could be characterized as some of the more "heavy handed" tactics Amazon uses to get its way. What does Amazon's growing strength -- or the growing dominance of a small number of companies in the book channel -- mean for the future of books and literature?


GRITtv: Colin Robinson: Amazon Books & Intellectual ...
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Google adds captions to YouTube videos

According to an article from The New York Times, Google has added technology to the YouTube website that will automatically insert English text captions into the videos. This will make the videos accessible to the deaf and hearing impaired, as well as to users across the world because the text captions can be translated into 51 languages. The new technology will also help users search for specific text within a video. There are already captioned videos available on YouTube but the captions are either added manually or the videos are from networks that include captions. Initially Google will add the caption technology to its own educational videos and those from Stanford, Yale, Duke, Columbia, MIT, PBS, National Geographic, and a few other channels. The technology will be expanded to other channels gradually so that it can be tested. Google has also introduced an additional service to make it easier to use the manual caption technology. Users can upload a text file with the words in the video and the technology will match up the text to the words as they are spoken.

Digital Education video

A posting on the Digital Education blog features a great digital video that was created by a third grade class to show the ways that multimedia tools can be used to engage students in creative learning environments. The video entitled, “Living in a Digital World”, won for Best Picture at the National Educational Computing Conference. Just think what it will be like when these kids reach Higher Ed!