Los Angeles Convention Center
Monday, October 18, 1999

 Jay's notes & photos of the event.

Gloria Gery kicked things off after 25 minutes of silence (AV snafu), certainly an embarrassment for the publishers of Presentations magazine. 3,000 people have registered for this event, 4,500 if you count everyone who passes through the door. Online Learning News has 55,000 email subscribers!

Fusion of learning and doing on the way.

Pitfalls of online learning:

• falling in love with the messenger (confuse means and ends)

• becoming isolated from the core business

• defaulting to the familiar (automating the last war)

• not integrating with other organizations

Panel:

1. Gloria Gery (comments =#1)
2. Michael Hawley of the Media Lab 2
3. Michael Allen (PLATO, creator of Authorware) 4
4. Michael Milken 5
   Bob Jecman of Intel 3

 #5 KU is young, industry is immature. At the highest level is art, not science. ILT will continue on but adaptive learning (learning that becomes your friend) is just starting now.

#4 design? access is important but that’s not all there is. not using what we know.

#2 media lab = nuthouse. learning by building things. deny that anything’s “impossible.”

#3 portable? wireless is on the way.

 #5 silent stars didn’t make it to talkies. radio personalities didn’t all play on t.v. moving old-style learning to the net doesn’t play. how can we personalize the learning experience? takes entertainment, too.

#2 Lucasfilm. starwars script #1 pre-word processor. now his next film will be 100% digital, not a film at all. by contrast, people are pretty much the same as during the era of the greeks.

#5 entertainment industry doesn’t have mandatory attendance. they have to make things enjoyable enough to draw an audience. that’s the proper goal for training.

Gloria: seductive learning. but little time for development. what do we do?

#4 authorware – it’s terrible. people say, “I’ve been a student, so I know how to teach.” wrong! there’s a lot more to it. we need better tools, better leadership.

Gloria announces that the refreshment break is being sponsored by SmartForce, which we used to know as CBT Systems.

During the break, participants snap at the new brochures like hungry fish.

Bob Jecman, Intel

“ Intel Content services is working with CBT Systems, a leader in computer-based IT training, to deliver interactive, 3d and streaming media to its customers on the web.”

Ah ha! Here’s a useful application. You can grab a server, stick it in a rack, and cable components together. Buzz goes through the audience.

Michael Hawley, MIT Media Lab, sits down at the piano.   “Things that think.”

in steve jobs’ new office at pixar, the table is top from a bosendorfer piano on legs. any meeting with steve is a jam session.

Michael sits down at the piano and plays the graceful ghost rag. Hawley had received a call from the van cliburn foundation (which holds a competition every four years.) michael was invited to their first amateur competition. unlike the pros, these people had lives. steve jobs lamented that this is not done for the computer industry. where’s the amateur spirit?

are recitals dead? in the 1800s, liszt started the public performance. opened the lid to the audience, painted the piano black for dramatic effect, and dressed like a rock star. with a piano you only get something out when you put something in. there’s room for two on the bench. it was the sports of its era.

for us, the personal computer has passed its peak.

Smithsonian institution trying to put together an exhibit on invention. they called ray Bradbury. “I’ll give you my suggestions but I don’t want any questions later. and my fee will be $100,000.” the Smithsonian blew off $500,000 chasing other ideas before calling Bradbury back for help. for $100K, he said one word, “garages.” it’s the right word. henry ford’s, hewlett’s, jobs’, edison’s, etc.

michael’s one word for us is “Pinocchio.” shows us a videotape from 1988 (“the late bronze age”), apple’s knowledge navigator. fantasy: they got a lot of it right but underestimated the power of the internet. tough to estimate where we’ll be in five years.

1980-1990 IBM earned $8-$9 billion a year. ’90 IBM earned $11 billion! then 0 billion, then -$9 billion, then -$15 billion.

ATT spun off bell labs, chucked western electric into Lucent. within a year and a half, lucent much larger than ATT itself. ATT almost thrown out of the game.

computing + communications = the disruptive coupling

Galapagos. marine iguana, tiny lava lizard sitting on its head. a different perspective is worth a hundred points of IQ. Darwin only 22 on the beagle.

you don’t learn to swim by going online.

someday you’ll pick up a Barbie doll and it will have more computing hardware than a space shuttle.

furby has more processing power than the lunar lander. capillaries from variety of devices. furbies will hook into the net. toys. values of play. the lessons stick.

lego. wooden blocks. plastic holds them together. mindstorms sold 100,000 – 30,000 for kids, the rest for silicon valley engineers. legos coming to life.

tomato inscribed with instructions.

counter intelligence. about developing the smart kitchen. NSA calls, saying, “count us in.”

putting your body on line. US spends a trillion a year on medical care. we spend twice as much per capita as anyone else. heart sensor + wristwatch = blip, blip, you have two hours to live. healthcare is now disconnected. paper records, lost ambulance, etc.

open heart survivors. two questions: do you have a confidante? (e.g. wife, partner, great friend) are you a member of a group? six months after surgery, all the no/no category folk were dead. 70% (I think) of the connected people live on. the reason you live is other people. if your loved ones could monitor your health, imagine….

teller. 1856.  French dealing with skirmishes in Algeria. tribes led by magicians and witch doctors. French invited a magician to visit the front lines. Robert Houdin. platter; tureen of steaming coffee appears. strongbox. pick it up. abracadabra. can’t pick it up. electromagnet under stage. Algerians capitulate to the superior magician.

 sooner we can break past the glass of the monitor, the better off we’ll be. do something wonderful with this stuff.

The multi-vendor booths are not cutting it, at least for me. At the Lotus booth, the president of some tiny firm showed me a pedestrian call center training program; Click2Learn had a dozen “partners,” each doing their own thing. Lots of traffic but little in it for the sponsoring organization.

Saba Software’s booth had a fellow whose badge identified him as “Director of Marketing,” but who was actually a professional presenter, giving an overview of Saba’s relationship with Netscape. Saba is a web-based training management system, pure HTML, furthering the “learner-centric paradigm.”

Teamscape provides a similar offering (Schwab’s a client) and has more user-friendly marketing. They took part in the learner server shootout that will appear in PC Week in mid November; Saba didn’t show.

Allison Rossett and Bob Hoffman of SDSU gave a user-friendly breakout for academics on shortening the distance of distance learning, recounting their lessons from leading distance ed programs.

Studies document that focus on learner choice and learner-centered strategies  have a positive impact on learning outcomes.

Hoffman described the “I CARE” framework for bring faculty up to speed. It’s low tech or high, your choice.

Introduction

Connect

Apply – do it

Reflect – put new knowledge into personal context, closure by telling others

Extend – assess, evaluate, remediate, enrich, more info

check out edweb.sdsu.edu/edtec

also sandbox.sdsu.edu

Remember: Edison thought movies would replace textbooks.

Don’t play one media against another, e.g. which is better for X. Think of the cumulative results. Or good web vs poor instruction. Etc.

Tuesday, October 19, 1999

Jeff Papos, Lotus

KM is the killer app

evolution of our paradigms

email. now more than electrified mail. latency of knowledge.

networks. were resource sharing (Novell). then shared info. Internet now about electronic community.

learning is a lot more than online learning. now it’s about creating the “knowledge enterprise.” distributed learning is about rewriting all of our business processes.

worldwide distributed learning market, 1997-2002 108% CAGR. $15 billion market 28 months hence. 4,000 IBM researchers working specifically on online learning.

merrill’s book of knowledge: old days, learn to drive a tractor and it’s a useful skill for 40 years. now, product cycles cutting that time to a year.

IT turnover running 14%.

New competitive landscape

BIT BASED COMPANIES challenges to e-business: building brand awareness, economies of scale, lack of experience. think eToys

ATOM BASED COMPANIES fear and frustration for traditional business: diseconomies of scale, dysfunctional KM capabilities, speed to market. think ToysRUs

comptroller of the currency has 360 applications pending for internet banks!!!

leveraging online approaches to achieve results. deliver content as self-paced (rapid distribution, Lotus buys Pathware), collaborative (deeper learning, long-term results, Learning Space), live/virtual classroom (travel savings, standards). wrong for Lotus to do these piecemeal. need single object repository for content no matter how it’s delivered.

“Companies with an infrastructure of clients, content, technology, and services from a variety of sources will be the most successful.” – Ellen Julian, IDC

Need a place to create knowledge (Notes or Outlook. something convenient for sharing). Need to improve Search capability.

example of GE Medical

knowledge gap challenge

·        expand training options to field employees at a reasonable price

solution

·        use Learning Space for highly interactive, online learning

business value

·        allows mobile workforce to learn anytime, anywhere

·        maximizes employees’ productivity by increasing time with customers

multiple-path approach used. lots of collaboration.

Pathware demo

Richard Close.

Ellen Julian. IDC will now use “e-Learning” in lieu of Internet-based learning, web-based training.

Why is elearning so critical today?

attract, retain, grow employees.

knowledge and skills recognized as critical resources in global economy.

revised valuation of human capital brings attention to skill gaps (senior management metric)

increased focus on continuous learning

competition

technology

employee turnover

small labor pools

IT training spending from ’96 to ‘98

‘96 $3,500

’97 $6,200

’98 $6,200

business and soft skills training in 1998

24% of IS department budget

42% outside the IS department

good bit of this is videotape (still)

in Ellen’s lingo, “Internet learning” includes intranets, extranets, internet time group

Interviews with 201 companies. 25% used IBL, larger companies

Satisfaction with Internet-based learning

85% training mgrs strongly recommend IBL

43% of other dept managers strongly recommend

60% IS managers as well

Reservations

not appropriate medium for all content

limited availability of content

difficult fit with existing IS infrastructure

prohibitive cost of content conversion

Other obstacles

managers not convinced of need for IBL

need for more interactivity and sophistication of course development

who will provide service and support? (Andersen, US West)

who will host

Rationale for IT Use

Scalable

Enables learners to take control of their learning paths

Reduces travel

Provides management with a way to track learner progress (down to the second)

What are vendors doing to address IBL needs?

converting content, chunking, object orientation

forming alliances

increasing focus on quality and interactivity

more robust solutions

adding thinks like mentoring

What lies ahead?

wider adoption of IBL (esp. by small co’s)

new purchases of learning solutions

supplier consolidation

enhancement of value-added services

(support, security[1], maintenance, mentoring, custom course development, hosting)

The illiterate of the 21^st century will not be those who cannot read and write, but those who cannot learn, unlearn, and relearn. Alvin Toffler

Richard Close

Close Productions, Ridgefield CT  203.431.1541

closeprod@aol.com

think two years ago

expected market to explode as the channel grabs hold, but…

the IT training channel didn’t have software – they had instructors, tangible sell

shifted to multimedia front-end.

new players coming out of entertainment industry.

becoming a publishing company.

threat: Microsoft could offer certification training for free.

There’s no difference between marketing and training.