Tech Trends that Didn't Happen

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Permalink Reply by Ian Berg on December 7, 2011 at 10:03am

As depicted in Back To The Future 2 when Marty travels to 2015:

Automatically fitting shoes & jackets

Meal in a pill

Hover cars

Hover skateboards

Hologram movies

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Permalink Reply by Karen Henke on December 7, 2011 at 12:32pm

I should be more specific--tech trends hyped for school and education that did not happen. :)

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Permalink Reply by Christopher Casal on December 8, 2011 at 5:06am

Palm Pilots (ahead of their time and then not able to scale & compete with the iPod/iPad)

XO-1 (the "$100 laptop")

I'm sure I'll think of others as soon as I walk away from my computer...

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Permalink Reply by Evaggelos on December 9, 2011 at 9:52pm

Oops. UNIX is still happening. My various Mac products, laptop, desktop etc. are all  running system 10 which is UNIX-based. My MacBook Pro has been such a reliable laptop and I just love it.

Get it? Apple Computers=UNIX=Reliable=Satisfaction

Evaggelos

Online School Records

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Permalink Reply by Karen Henke on December 12, 2011 at 10:57am

I was picturing UNIX labs where kids were learning to program. UNIX as the basis for what we are using today, absolutely. As I've been working on the list, I'm discovering that trends that didn't happen often became underlying technologies or transitional stepping stones to get to where we are today.

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Permalink Reply by Evaggelos on December 12, 2011 at 3:12pm

Got it. That reminds me of BASIC, the computer language.

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Permalink Reply by Scott Armstrong on December 10, 2011 at 1:24pm

That's a good list.  I'm still holding out hope for thin clients! :)

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Permalink Reply by Christopher Casal on December 12, 2011 at 10:54am

I think the closest education will get to thin clients will be something like the Google Chromebook. Internally managed thin clients are something I don't think education has the stomach, personnel, or funds to tackle.

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Permalink Reply by Karen Henke on December 12, 2011 at 10:58am

I was a huge proponent of thin clients and a lot of the idea of thin clients really is at the heart of many of today's technologies. The closer we get to the cloud, the closer we get to thin clients.

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Permalink Reply by Karen Henke on December 12, 2011 at 11:00am

More ideas:

Stylus as input device

Dial-up access

A teacher maintaining their own web site

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Permalink Reply by Christopher Casal on December 13, 2011 at 6:20am

I think those 3 are a stretch

The stylus was was never something I would call a "trend", it was more an accessory specific to a few distinct pieces of hardware (Palm Pilots for instance). Now, Palm Pilots as a trend, that is something I would agree with.

Dial-up access wasn't a trend but rather a stepping stone in the development path to high-speed, always-on connectivity. Once things like DSL, Cable Modems, and school LANs became more accessible there was no need for dial-up. It was also something everyone used, because it was the only way to access the interner. Dial-up wasn't specific to education, it was the singular format for most people for a long time (I worked in the high-tech sector from '97-02 and the company had a dial-up account/access the entire time for employees to work from home and on the road).

I would also disagree with "A teacher maintaining their own website"

A lot of teachers at my school have, and maintain, very active websites. They post class information, assignments, rubrics, student work, etc. The fact there are things like Edublog Awards is evidence educators are building and maintaing websites of all shapes & styles.

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