Movies have explored this for a while – Inception where reality and imagination are interspersed, the virtual reality of The Matrix, the simulation environment in Avatar. Yet to the discerning scholar, the idea of a deeper, connected reality, that can be explored the way one peels an onion, the old as civilization itself – from platonic ideas that form the truth behind “reality” that is a mere shadow on a cavern, to the medieval view of the world where everything is a symbol of a deeper reality, to be scrutinized by the careful eye.

Unlike cyberspace that draws away from the real world, the metaverse allows its participants to be still aware of the real world around them – in fact, this real world is very much part of the metaverse itself. Mark Zuckerberg reflected on the omnipresence of screens – “We were not meant to live this way”, he commented. In contrast, the metaverse creates a richer reality – not an alternative one. For instance, Nissan is exploring adding virtual information on a car’s windshield, including an ability to summon 3D avatars, in a technology called ”invisible to visible”.

What does it mean for education? If reality is being reshaped – or at least reinterpreted – how can this affect pedagogy? A well-known essay by the venture capitalist Matthew Ball defined the key aspects of the metaverse. How do these, if at all, apply to education?

According to Matthew Ball, the Metaverse will be:

• Persistent – “it never “resets or pauses”, or “ends” , it just continues indefinitely”.  Arguable, the same holds true for learning – the shift from “sporadic” to “persistent” is already happening. One well-understood aspect of this is the shift from a “once-and-for all” degree model to a lifelong learning model, as professional skills need to be replenished on a continuous basis – not just for the workforce to be productive, but for us as human beings to remain fresh. Education is never “over”, “done with” – there is no such thing a stillness in a nature – just like in physical fitness, we can only sharpen or loose our skills. Coursera’s valuation when it went public last year is testimony to the fact that this shift is well under way; traditional educational institutions such as Harvard or Yale were quick to pick up on this, through the likes of EdEx or a deconstructed panel of certificates that can accompany one’s lifelong career. However, a less understood aspect of “an education that never stops” goes beyond its lifelong aspect – it is learning woven into everyday life. Today’s students know this well; in focus groups conducted this year, students shared that they like to integrate learning into everyday routines. This is how YouTube became, among other things, an educational company. For instance, apps such as Vroom integrate early childhood learning into everyday life – making learning part of mealtime, bedtime or bathtime.

The metaverse can provide an ideal ground for educational experiences that never end and always draw you further – because every real life experience, from a hike in the woods to a museum visit or even everyday science experiments in the kitchen, can be deepened and enhanced, the way hypertext enhanced every reading experience in the early days of the Internet. This is very different from today’s internet that takes us away from reality or social media that perhaps reveals the undercurrents of social relationships rather than enhancing them. With the metaverse, could we one day talk about a rich living experience the way we do about a rich reading experience?

• Be Synchronous and live. Just as the pandemic caused every museum in the world to open their doors to virtual visitors, and suddenly made all the riches of human culture accessible to everyone, without the need to travel – in the metaverse, one might have the opportunity to attend any virtual event, anywhere in the world, in (avatar) person. Lecture by a renowned Stanford professor? Gallery opening in Berlin? Concert at the Vienna Philarmonic? Panel at Davos? Debate at Aspen? Trip to Mars with Elon Musk? You name it, you can go. Limitations of space, geography, access, class or connections – can be removed in important ways. A professor will be able to invite experts from around the world to a panel. Researchers can get together in a live symposium to advance thinking on critical topics. In a trend that is already under way, as Stanford and MIT made their courses available for free (in an asynchronous way) , education that was once available to a few becomes accessible to many– with a new kind of immersive experience. There was recently a discussion on how gaming companies keep upping the ante on endorphin release (and inadvertently create a breeding ground for depression as a biological balancing mechanism). Tired of old-style immersive gaming? Try the most immersive experience of all – nature and reality.

We are talking about a convergence of education, content, entertainment, technology and gaming – forming partnerships to create these new kinds of experiences. It is likely that none of the current players have what it takes to do it all. What EdTech platform will be best positioned to create an interaction field, in Erich Joachimsthaler’s words, that can bring the metaverse ecosystem together on one platform, and optimize interactions for all?

• Be an experience that spans both the digital and physical world, private and public networks/experiences, open and closed platforms. This is the very definition of an interaction field. What will be the role of educational institutions and players in this new universe? Will they become orchestrators of learning experiences – leading virtual visits to public museums, providing a stage for private companies looking to hire their graduates to assess their skills in a real-life project? Will they become curators of everyday educational challenges? How will they react to the emergence of a new set of players, as Google and other tech giants expand beyond offering certificates into offering a platform for entrepreneurship and creativity?
• Offer unprecedented interoperability of data, digital items/assets, content and so on. Will there be a market for “second-hand” virtual objects? “Unused” digital experiences? With the scarcity factor of limited space and inventory removed, how will this affect pricing models – pressing down prices due to increased availability or eliminating last-minute price sinking? As objects and experiences can be likely reused within the metaverse, an artifact created as an educational project could gain a second life in the post-educational world – will educational projects become the new stage for experimenting? Most likely, the very boundaries between education and the post-educational world will erode.
• Be populated by “Content” and “experiences” created and operated by an incredibly wide range of contributors, some of whom are independent individuals, while others might be formally organized groups or commercially focused enterprises. This is the very definition of an Interaction Field, according to Erich Joachimsthaler – an ecosystem where participants derive value from the exchange. With entry barriers dramatically removed, the metaverse will create many such opportunities for exchange. Will students start their own coaching practices? Will NGOs and non-profits enlist student volunteers into solving the world’s biggest problems? Will new associations and industry coalitions emerge, allowing to individuals or companies to find more like-minded thought partners working on similar problems? Will educational companies be run more like networks that product companies?

Discussions about the metaverse can have a polarizing effect. Many of these effects can seem far-away or outlandish, before one realizes that many of these are shifts that are already under way – and offer fertile ground for the emergence of new types of interactions and value exchanges. In a way, education is too central a part of life to be untouched by the metaverse, or what will be the next stage of today’s cyberspace. For a new generation that will experience these newly immersive experience, this will become not a choice but a sine qua non – with the attention of young minds at stake, education and pedagogy will have to rival the attraction of the newly emerging platforms. The good news is that that time around, learning and life, virtual reality and nature will not be stacked against each other – they will be part of one. If you talk to your kids about how the virtual world can be a distraction from learning, wait till they talk to their own kids about daily routines as a distraction from education so immersive, so exciting, that it will draw learners in and leave then always wanting more.

This exciting world already exists. It’s called learning.

The post The Metaverse in Education: Hype or reality? appeared first on Vivaldi.

I leave the conference every year with lots of insights and inspiration and also some practical tools about how to build platform businesses.

One of these practical tools presented this year was by Marshall Van Alstyne who briefly mentioned the case of Quibi, the high profile launch by Jeffrey Katzenberg and Meg Whitman, and Quibi has so far failed to live up to expectations of subscriber growth.

Van Alstyne defines a platform as an open architecture with rules of governance designed to facilitate interactions.[ii] He explained that in designing a platform you either want to have high-value interactions, examples are Games of Thrones, Breaking Bad or Sopranos or high volume interactions, examples are YouTube or TikTok.

Quibi is the “watch bite-sized content on your phone” streaming platform that offers entirely new content, dramatic shows, comedic shows, reality TV and news bites intended to be watched while on a subway, between breakfast and your daily exercise, or while riding a Peloton bike, any brief breaks from the activities of the day.

Courtesy of MIT Initiative on the Digital Economy

In the introductory speech of the 2020 MIT Platform Summit – Platform Review and Forecast, about minute 39:50 onwards, Van Alstyne explains how to use this tool for designing interactions.[iii] Quibi, unfortunately, chose a low value, low volume interaction strategy. They are neither “fish nor fowl” as he explains.

I have used this tool in a number of applications over the years. It is really useful when designing a platform and having to make the three key decisions: Interactions, Architecture and Governance.

I found the tool useful not just to designing interactions but also deciding on the type of architecture for the platform. For example, Van Alstyne mentions that TikTok and YouTube have the added advantage that third-parties are creating the content which is the “inverted firm” concept of Van Alstyne and Parker.

How to define value of interactions

In my work on platforms and digital ecosystems, I find it helpful to think of at least three steps: framing, designing, and building the platform or digital ecosystem. Until now I have described the digital tool that Van Alstyne presented in terms of the Designing phase: Interactions, Architecture and Governance.

I also think that the tool helps in the other two phases, namely framing the platform business and in building the platform business. Framing is about what problem you are solving for the customer, the industry or society. From a customer perspective, it is defining what you aspire to stand for, how you connect in their lives, and what meaning you intend to create. In short, it is about the value proposition or brand promise that you deliver or intend to deliver.

Quibi might have missed a beat here. Did it really solve a problem that consumers have by pushing out one episode a day over weeks, when consumers have become used to binge watching entire seasons or watch movies all in one sitting. For more on this, see here.[iv]

The third phase also matters, that of actually building the platform. BCG in a study of 100 platform businesses for example found that seven of ten failed in this phase.[v] That is, a key part of building is scaling the platform in an efficient way. Van Alstyne and Parker discussed this issue as well in numerous articles and books.

I find that it is important that building the platform business requires carefully weighing how to take advantage of network effects, learning effects and viral effects.

Therefore, when I look at the value of interactions, I look at them in three ways: meaning, shared or new value or benefits, and reciprocity. A few examples:

·      Meaning

o  LEGO’s brand promise is about the joy of building and the pride of creation. When LEGO launched its LEGO Ideas platform where fans of LEGO can submit their own creations and share them with a large network of other LEGO fans, LEGO builds interaction value that reinforces the meaning of the overall brand promise of LEGO.

o  Mars Petcare is about creating a better world for pets. Mars launched Kinship which is a business division of Mars and collaboration platform for entrepreneurs, innovators and industry partners to create new products and services to further pet care. The interactions that Kinship creates a meaning for Mars Petcare.[vi]

·      New and shared benefits

o  When John Deere collects farm data on soil condition and farm productivity data from thousands of farmers, it can use data, analytics and technology to improve productivity per hectare for farmers, but it also can make the data available to Bayer or Dow to optimize crop and fertilizer utilization that creates shared benefits for the industry.

o  When Kloeckner, a metal trading firm in Germany introduced XOM, a trading platform, it creates price transparency and also solves for major inefficiencies and frictions in the industry concerning inventory management, hence delivering shared value or benefits for everyone.[vii]

·      Reciprocity

o  GoPro is best known for its action cameras but its continued success has less to do with camera technology and more with its mobile apps and video-editing capabilities that enables a content platform among millions of passionate GoPro users who create content, upload and share content on the GoPro network. It is the reciprocity of the interactions between users and GoPro that creates enormous value.

o  Vitality is an insurance company and program that rewards members for better living, more healthy living. This South African company has figured out that in order to reduce health costs, it isn’t just about cost reductions among providers, payers or pharmaceutical companies, it can also be done by actively involving its members. That is the interactions are designed so that all major participants including patients engage in reciprocal ways to improve health outcomes and reduce overall healthcare costs.

In short, in order to get the maximum impact from network effects, learning effects and viral effects, and to maximize the chances that a platform business is successful, its worthwhile to look at the value of interactions in terms of meaning, benefits, and reciprocity, and frequency or volume, as discussed by Van Alstyne.

For more details, see my new book: https://www.amazon.com/-/es/Erich-Joachimsthaler/dp/1541730518?language=en_US

[i] http://ide.mit.edu/events/2020-mit-platform-strategy-summit

[ii] https://www.weforum.org/whitepapers/platforms-and-ecosystems-enabling-the-digital-economy, page 9

[iii] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CUQaqMILuKQ&list=PLNmZUX7tW6t-iapgvuNhHInsUhgu7JyV8&index=2&t=2461s

[iv] https://www.forbes.com/sites/scottmendelson/2020/06/15/why-jeffrey-katzenberg-and-meg-whitman-quibi-was-always-doomed-to-fail/#85d12fb745e9

[v] Ulrich Pidun, Martin Reeves, and Maximilian Schuessler, Why Do Most Business Ecosystems Fail, BCG Henderson Institute whitepaper, https://www.bcg.com/publications/2020/why-do-most-business-ecosystems-fail

[vi] https://www.prnewswire.com/news-releases/first-of-its-kind-coalition-launches-to-drive-pet-care-innovation-300823376.html#:~:text=Kinship%20is%20a%20business%20division,About%20Mars%20Petcare; see also: Thomas W. Malnight, Ivy Buche, and Charles Dhanaraj (2019), “Put Purpose At the Core of Your Strategy,” Harvard Business Review, September – October.

[vii] See for example, Rita Gunther McGrath and Ryan McManus, Discovery-driven Digital Transformation, May-June 2020, Harvard Business Review, https://hbr.org/2020/05/discovery-driven-digital-transformation

The post Words from the CEO: Interactions are the Source of Value in Platform Businesses appeared first on Vivaldi.