Convenience over Quality?

I think I've touched on this before, but "The Good Enough Revolution" caused me to re-reflect on this issue in our society today. We are a living in a world of now. Last time I talked about it I called it instant gratification, and that isn't far off from what is being described in this article. The article is discussing how our world accepts things as "good enough" instead of actually striving to produce the best quality products. I would have to agree with this.

"Don't believe the myth of quality," Capps says. He's right. We've started accepting lower quality of everything as a trade off for convenience. He gives a number of examples (Kindle versus paper, MP3s versus analog music, etc.), but I can also think of quite a few examples of this from personal experience. There have been more than a handful of times when I've needed something, let's say an iPhone charger. Apple makes the only "verified" iPhone charger and the knock offs are generally way shiftier quality and break fairly quickly. They also cost way less. But they sell the knock offs on Amazon. So I have purchased the knock offs simply because I can get them right away rather than waiting for Apple to process an order for a higher quality product, I've chosen convenience over quality time and time again.

An interesting counter argument to this, however, is the food industry. It is my observation (and experience) that while almost every other area of our life follows the "convenience over quality" mantra, the millennial generation has almost certainly adopted the opposite mantra when it comes to our eating habits. Whereas the generation just above us grew up with staples like Mcdonald's, Taco Bell, and KFC at the dinner table or in the lunchbox, our generation has demanded a higher standard and a new breed of "fast food has emerged because of it. This new breed-- the Chipotle type restaurant, which fuses the order-at-the-counter convenience with the farm-to-table quality that millennials desire-- is popping up all over the country, and is beginning to affect the business of the old conglomerates of fast food. Millennials demand a different taste and style of food than traditional, low-quality, convenient fast food chains can offer.

                           
This Forbes article (where the chart was taken from) shows some interesting statistics about the fast food industry and this change over the past few years. http://www.forbes.com/sites/aliciaadamczyk/2014/07/09/millennials-prefer-quality-over-convenience-reveals-new-survey/#37058a4731fc

In conclusion, I think the "good enough" mindset is certainly a problem we need to address-- but do not think it can be regarded as universal.

"Let the Students Play"

This is one of the harder topics in digital media for me to address. The reason? I am graduating in May and moving to Houston to teach elementary school. So this topic, the topic of the effects of technology and digital media in the classroom, is very relevant not only for me long term for when I have kids of my own, but for me right now as a soon-to-be elementary school teacher who has to find out on my own what role technology will play in my own classroom. 

If you had asked me point blank without any research and after simply reading this article, I would have said technology would have a very minimal role in my classroom. I would have said that I was a millennial, a product of the technology generation, and that I knew the statistics behind how technology can hamper learning. I would have said that teachers should be allowed to teach however they see fit, and not forced to integrate technology into their curriculums. And I would have said that, for low income school particularly, technology integration in schools added a whole other level of separation between them and their higher income peers. 

But those views are starting to change. I'm starting to see things a little bit differently. Part of the reason for this change was the New York Times article. Although I don't necessarily think this is what they intended readers to get out of the article, what I got was the overwhelming verification that teachers needed to  adapt with the times. I am joining the Teach for America Corps. This is a profession that believes in transformative education-- not in relying solely on traditional methods. Traditional methods work much of the time, that is why they have become tradition. But times change and we, as teachers, must adapt with those times. 

Then I found this video of a TED talk by a fellow teacher. In the video, she discusses "21st Century Learning." She outlines the ways she has implemented technology into her curriculum. I loved what she had to say. I loved the way she related real world digital technology to elementary education. She talks about "letting the students play," and not in a sense that makes them unruly but in a way that allows them to enjoy their education. She made me want to be a 21st century teacher. I'm not saying that I want to integrate technology as much as she does, but what I do want is to engage children through a variety of mediums that they can relate to. It doesn't really matter how I learned material, times are different and students are going to learn differently. I want to follow Kayla's advice and use digital media in my own classroom so instead of "giving students an education, making them want to take it."

I encourage you to watch the short video of Kayla's talk below. 

Old Things Are Best

I'm a traditionalist. I don't like change. So I'm going to be honest when I say that this post, and my opinions on this topic, are really pretty biased. I don't want to see print newspapers disappear. Just like I don't want to see every bookstore shut down, movie theatres go out of business, and restaurant have to install a wifi router to keep business up and running. Despite the fact the Professor Chyi mentions that most people find her theory "hard to swallow," I agree with her, and I hope she is right. Here's a little story, albeit a little cheesy, to show you why. My grandpa spent his entire career in the publishing business. His last 20 years were spend as a consultant to Outdoor Life and Sports Afield magazines. He loved the outdoors and he loved to write. His job was perfect for him. My grandpa developed lung cancer in the late 1980s. He was only in his mid 60s. It was during this time that he wrote this piece. It was never published during his lifetime, but when he passed away from the cancer in 1993, Guns and Ammo magazine published it in his memory. A man in his final years of life reflected back on his time and came to one conclusion: old things are best.

"Old things are better than new things. They may not perform better, but they are nicer to own; they are friends. My Randall knife, while not my oldest, is a prized possession, not for any monetary value that it might have-but because we’ve done a lot of fun things together in the past 30 years.

My oldest knife was “requisitioned” from the arms chest of the Tacloban Shore Patrol during WWII. Six months ago, I gave it a new handle of leather rings. It, too, provides memories.

I have two pairs of old leather bird boots, which date back to when they cost $18.00 to $20.00; big money then. Believe it or not, I still have fond memories of my first pair which were bought before the war, and carried me into the fifties. They were prime examples of what a cobbler could do if he really cared about old and good boots. They were from L.L. Bean, as is one of my current pairs.

Old wool deer pants are better than new ones only because you can look at the various repairs and bring back memories.

Old deer hunting friends are better than new ones. They took the test of time and passed. Old deer hunters are better than young ones. They know more and their hearts and legs make them move more slowly.

Old rifles are better than new ones, and, in the area, I must personalize the statement, for I have only had my current “old” rifle for one season. It’s a custom-stocked .308 built on a Sako action. The bluing has worn off due to it having been in and out of countless scabbards.

It previously belonged to Warren Page marksman, hunter, and Field & Stream writer. I’d like to think that it was one of his favorites because of its worn condition. It weights under seven pounds, with sling and scope. I can’t tell you all the places it has been, or the stalks or excitement it has witnessed.

However, I can tell you that on my back it has gone to four different states and accounted for three whitetail bucks. In time it will earn a place alongside my Randall as a source of retrospective good memories.

Old hats are better than new hats and everybody knows that. I brought mine home from the Pacific. Its previous owner, an Australian, gave it to me after punching me in the nose. I had, in company with an MP, walked into a bar and immediately found myself on the floor-for no particular reason other than being an American with a Shore Patrol band on my arm.

My old Aussie hat bears the inscription “Denham & Horgrove Ltd. Atherstone, 1943″ on the band. The felt is about 1/4” thick, and the brim keeps the rain off my glasses and the snow from going down my neck. Other than being practical and irreplaceable, it’s a best hat because it is old.

I have lot’s of good old things; old compasses, shirts, and two mended pairs of my father’s long red underwear. All these things give me warmth and comfort.

Someday you will get older and you, too, will be a best thing." - James R. Pierce Sr. 

So what does this have to do with Professor Chyi and the Ramen Noodle Theory? Well really, everything. I love the frankness of my grandpa's writing. He doesn't try to sugar coat that his old things "may not perform better" than the new things. This is just like the paper products we use today in comparison to the technology and online platforms they are up against. When it comes to performance, surely the paper products don't stand a chance. But as my grandpa talks about, it's not always about just the performance. Based on Professor Chyi's research, people obviously agree because they continue to use hard copies of newspapers in lieu of the much more advanced online options. So in summary, I think both the interview with Professor Chyi and my grandpa's article give us all something to think about. What matters to us when it really comes down to it? I hope we come to the same conclusion my grandpa did, I know I have! 

Value is Subjective

When I read the article about business models, I was very interested in the premise of the article. But really one line and concept caught my attention: "business models should not be concerned merely with the financial aspect of a business' they should deal with other aspects such as value creation" (Cha 61). The reason for this is because of my personal experience. The background information is this:

1. I have spent the past two summer working in finance, once in private equity and once in investment banking. 

2. After my summer in investment banking, I decided the industry was not the direction I wanted to head.

There was a very important reason I preferred private equity over investment banking. You could probably guess based on the first paragraph of this post: value creation. Private equity focuses on transforming businesses and finding the places where weak businesses have underapprecaited values. Investment banking doesn't appreciate companies in the same way. Despite my experience, I did a quick one-eighth in my career path because I started seeing value creation in a new light. 

Value creation has a number of different meaning and direction. It's extremely relative to what people value in their own lives. That's how I got to where I am today, which is an incoming teacher at an inner city school in Houston through Teach for America. Back in November, I had 3 offers on the table: two financial institutions and TFA. I sat down as the offer clocks were ticking and thought about what I wanted out of my life. Value creation was where my mind jumped. Then I remembered that value is subjective. What kind of value did I want to create? Did I want to create value in the financial portfolios of high net worth individuals? Did I want to create value in companies by transforming their business models? Or did I want to create value by investing in the next generation of leaders in America through early childhood education? I settled on the last. And I'm glad that I did. I don't know how I will determine value in the next 5 years, but for now that is where it is for me. 

My point in saying all of this is what the article says, as well. Value has to be created uniquely in every organization, industry, or field. All of the different social media sites have to find where their value is and leverage that. There is not "one size fits all" for value, and I think this is the main point of this article and a great lesson for all of us to learn. Obviously this article is clearly discussing value in terms of business models, but I think it really is getting to the heart of true value. 

This video provide an interesting view on business value creation, and is a great source of information when it comes down to understand where and how we can create value in a way that can be applied to a number of different jobs and industries. 

Instant Gratification

I find the "Long Tail" to be extremely interesting for a number of reasons. We've grown up in a consumer culture. Essentially everything we encounter on a day to day basis has been commodified, from products sold in store to our time and how we spent it. Everything has become a matter of maximizing potential outcomes. This theory/effect is no different.

We've grown up in a world of instant gratification. In our lifetimes, we've seen the transformation from the process of seeing something we like, desiring it, saving up for it, and eventually, maybe, making a purchase, to seeing something we like and buying it on the spot. We've seen the transformation from "Christmas Lists" to Christmas everyday, because we don't see the value in not acting on our desires.

This YouTube video is an interesting perspective on marketing to the Millennial generation. We are a generation that expects immediacy. "Give us what we want when we want it". This has a huge impact on the Long Tail effect discussed in the article. The primary distinction between the world our parents grew up in and the world we grew up in is that we are entirely dependent on technology. This dependency is a large part of the reason that we like the satisfy our demands immediately, and the reason marketers and producers have adapted all of their strategies to market to us. These changes are essentially the Long Tail effect in and of itself. Amazon is the perfect example. It has adapted into a company that can offer ANY product, instantly and delivered (most times) within two days right to our doorstep.  We want instant gratification? Fine. Amazon makes everything available, slashes prices, and makes it almost too easy to find exactly what you're looking for, just like the article discusses.

This second attached video talks about one last features of Millennials that applies to the Long Tail: we all think we are special. Millennials are a generation that have been raised to believe that we are each unique and special and have something to offer to the world that no one other than ourselves could possibly live up to. That's why mass-marketing doesn't usually work for us. It's the "niche" market we are looking for. Millennials don't want to be generic.