(iverson's) currentbuzz: A Google Package Challenges Microsoft

Miguel Helft in the NYTimes (registration required) is talking about it and so is Donna Bogatin in ZDnet Digital Markets. Google is announcing on 2/22/07 that its integrated set of tools including mail, webpage creator, spreadsheets and documents is going to be available in a Premier version as well as its current free version (with ads.)

Educators, in journalism and elsewhere as well as freelance writers or what these days might be called "stand alone journalists" ought to pay attention. I have been using gmail for a year or more and no one needs another description of how effective it is. Most people I talk to nowadays that don't use it admit they just haven't taken time to apply for an account. I encourage students with email monikers like "kissyface@whatever.com" or "darkwarlord@whichever.com" to consider moving to an eponymous @gmail.com account as they begin to apply for internships or jobs.

The pro reviewers I linked to are talking about savings and noting that big corps like P & G are not afraid to move to the google apps pro version. From my perspective, this is the "it tool" [that is a sort of pun] of 2007. In terms of classroom use, having students adopt docs & spreadsheets means that there are no more instances of "couldn't do the homework 'cuz I don't have Excel." No more, forgetting the paper at home or the missing file isn't on my thumb drive. Unless the power goes out or our college network is down or google crashes (all less likely in my experience than homework gone astray) the work is either there or not.

I can also put assigments and announcements out to students with countably fewer clicks using the sharing function, than I can with my kludgy course management software (we use jenzabar oasis, a relic of the days of punch cards, IMHO.)

I am working with other faculty on a set of new learning outcomes. How refreshing to be able to post it in google docs and then use the collaborate invitation. One version of the document that all of us can view and edit, and it has some of wiki view revisions features. Note to j faculty everywhere: I work with lovely, intelligent people who just won't try new-fangled things like a full wiki...

My work around for the poor charting and graphing in google spreadsheets is to introduce students to zoho.com and have them understand that google is not the only free Web 2.0 spreadsheet tool in the world.

Students begin to experience the lightness of being once they realize their work is not trapped in a classroom, locked on a thumbdrive, or unaccessible because it isn't stored on that extension of all of our nervous systems, the Internet.

That's what I think as a college teacher on the frontline of integrating tech, teaching and thinking.