In addition to the tremendous educational value I have seen in robotics, however, there is growing value in that area in terms of future careers. As the power of processing continues its relentless march into seeming infinity, we are getting close to a world of robotic devices that would appear to be out of science fiction. A popular video on YouTube lately has been film of a robot called Big Dog, a quadruped walking robot designed to carry military equipment. Another video making the rounds shows a prosthetic arm designed by Dean Kamen’s company that is so lifelike they call it the Luke Arm (as in Luke Skywalker). The military is funding much of the development of this field of study, but the spinoffs will move rapidly into other applications.

And this article describes a prediction just made that 3.5 million jobs will be replaced by robots in Japan by 2025. Not manufacturing jobs, but service jobs like nurses’ aides, receptionists, and so on. The Japanese population is aging rapidly, and there will be fewer and fewer young people to take on these jobs.

So this starts to look like a serious win-win situation to me. Robotics is a phenomenally exciting project-based learning experience for students of a wide variety of learning styles, one that immerses them in a process that thoroughly integrates design, creativity, mechanics, electronics, physics, math, and a host of many other areas - even art! And now, robotics is also a rapidly expanding career opportunity for our students. We need to look for more ways to give kids the chance to explore this fascinating, exciting area of study. (Or we may be importing all of our robots from Japan.)

I mention it here not to revel in arcane science, but because of an interesting technology backstory to this effort. As the Large Hadron Collider, or LHC, was being designed, the researchers realized that the volume of data it would produce was so large that it would potentially overwhelm the Internet when shared with scientists around the world. Their solution was to create a parallel network - that is amazingly fast. In addition to using fiber optics, the researchers designed an entirely new system for managing the transfer of the data. This combination creates a network that is up to 10,000 times faster than the existing Internet.

This technology is currently only available to certain institutions, but it will at some time begin to replace the Internet we currently use. Bandwidth will increase to a level that we literally can’t envision. What will we do with a technology that lets us back up a 120 gigabyte hard drive onto a remote server in five or ten seconds? The article linked above explores some of the conjectures, but the most dependable prediction for what we will do with that much capacity is something we haven’t thought of yet.

I’ve known there were clients (such as Adium for the Mac) that combine multiple IM services into one interface. However, today I’ve been exploring Digsby, which not only combines IM services, but also social networking applications such as Twitter and Facebook.

Now I have one application that sits on my screen and alerts me if any buddy is online from any of my online accounts, if there have been updates to any of the Twitter users that I follow, updates to my Facebook friends, or new emails to my Yahoo account. It will take a few weeks to see if it really changes my habits long-term, but for now I am finding myself far more likely to use these services because I can do it so much more quickly.

I can’t wait to see what happens in this market niche over the next 12 months!

Wesley Fryer used this system last week to broadcast live presentations from the Air and Space Museum in Washington D.C. Using a cellular data modem, a laptop and camcorder, he was able to set up anywhere he could receive a cell signal. And since the broadcasts can be archived, anyone who misses the live broadcasts can view them after the fact.

There are dozens of live broadcasts going on at any one time. Right now some guy is doing music lessons, answering questions of the people logged into the session. (He’s on every day from noon to four Pacific time.)

Of course, there will probably be some channels that have programs that won’t be appropriate for kids, so getting this through to a school network may prove to be a problem. (Not to mention the nonsense that shows up in the chat windows and protecting the bandwidth of the district.) But sooner or later there will school-safe versions and we’ll have enough bandwidth to have this a tool that students can use to share presentations across the world, or participate in presentations of mentors or experts out in the field.

I’ve even set up my own channel! I’ll be hanging out at http://www.ustream.tv/channel/ed-tech-chat off and on during the week of March 17. Drop on by and see if I’m online.

I love these little videos. (I wish I’d come up with the idea!) I also think the format lends itself very well to student-created videos. These producers have shown you can create compelling presentations using very simple materials and techniques. Good communication technique works with any medium!