Panopto is one of Tempo’s competitors that is more focused on Higher Ed. They do a good job of messaging and self-promotion and they are a Carnegie-Mellon originated startup, so I follow their Blog and this one seems applicable to PSA even though I may disagree with their conclusions here.
The technology hype cycle was made popular by Gartner and is generally applicable to many/most new tech:
So I agree with Panopto that MOOCs have been way over hyped, but I personally feel is that with the passage of time and investment, they will enter the “Slope of Enlightenment” and eventually play a major role in the transformation of education.
I think the last think we need is another acronym (SPOC) that tries to repackage other concepts and call them new.
Gary
Hype Cycle is a relevant topic here, as we per force must pay attention to the beginnings of change as they appear, without knowing what comes next.
I like Gartner’s illustration above. Often, not always, a panned tech will have a new improved implementation, perhaps incrementally, and then eventually the full promise is manifest.
But the cycle can have a lot of ups and downs before the plateau of productivity arrives…and even that will be disrupted at some point, theoretically.
There are many examples, and one of the more intriguing currently is the “future of VR”, because ever smaller and more powerful and networked devices do seem to be getting another bite at the apple to show what VR can do. Who knows how far off some of the more dramatic possibilities are, but would anyone want to bet today that VR isn’t going to be really huge?
PSA has been noting for a while that online learning has to incorporate what we call 7 Core Elements into a functioning whole, and that since each element involves different capabilities and innovations, we are unlikely to see anytime soon the optimal mashup of all elements working well together.
Instead, we’ll get various attempts and approaches that do some things well, but other things not so much. This will sow much confusion, such as this link on MOOC or SPOC, while the limited versions with achilles heels get rolled out.
As with all things, the press will run their cycle from hyping to trashing and back again, while the difficult process of figuring out how to make every core element work well and together unfolds.
Talking some years of this to look forward to. Perhaps longer, when one also includes institutional and societal push back on risk of change. Eventually the promise will become manifest and self evident. And then Bucky Fuller’s dictum of best way to change is to make the former obsolete will come into play.
Of course, the middle ages happened too. =^)