The Adobe MAX Education Summit has been chock full of interesting and creative individuals showcasing some of the coolest new educational technology tools and resources. (More on that in the coming days.) I wish every Edudemic reader could be in attendance but, since that hasn’t happened, I’m doing the next best thing. Blog posts!
Here’s the situation: the Adobe MAX Education Summit has been chock-full of inspirational ideas and exciting real-world technology. In an effort to bring you extensive coverage of the event, I thought it might be helpful to share some of the stand-out quotes from the Adobe executives and guest speakers.
The quotes cover Adobe’s new strategic positioning expected to be unveiled tomorrow (hint: easier-to-use and cheaper apps, HTML5, and finding a niche market) as well as Adobe’s stance on innovation, education and where the two intersect.
[I'll be updating this post as Adobe MAX continues. Expect more information after the highly anticipated keynote address by CTO Kevin Lynch tomorrow.]
“If Google can figure [design] out, anyone can figure it out.” -Michael Gough, Vice President Product Experience, Adobe
“We desperately need more tech-savvy students” -Michael Gough, Vice President Product Experience, Adobe
”How many of you [in the audience] had tablets 5-6 years ago? (2 of 150 hands go up.) Yup. The landscape has fundamentally changed.” -Trevor Bailey, Director, K-12 and Higher Education, Worldwide Education Marketing, Adobe
Technology is good but it’s really hard to keep up.” -Trevor Bailey, Director, K-12 and Higher Education, Worldwide Education Marketing, Adobe
“For-profit schools are doing things now that public schools will have to do soon.” -Trevor Bailey, Director, K-12 and Higher Education, Worldwide Education Marketing, Adobe
“The 4 biggest trends in K-12 are decreasing budgets, collaboration is exploding, sharing resources is bigger, and professional development is moving online more than ever before.” -Trevor Bailey, Director, K-12 and Higher Education, Worldwide Education Marketing, Adobe
“We no longer need the usual user-experience tools we’re used to.” (e.g. scrollbars, mouse, keyboard) -Michael Gough, Vice President Product Experience, Adobe
“The 4 biggest things impacting education technology are connectedness, interaction, mobility, and size.” -Michael Gough, Vice President Product Experience, Adobe
“Making things look natural is now far more possible than on desktops.” -Michael Gough, Vice President Product Experience, Adobe
“We’re learning that not all mobile applications need a ton of buttons, etc.” -Michael Gough, Vice President Product Experience, Adobe
“We now have to ask people which hand they’re using. Haven’t had to do that, well, ever before.” -Michael Gough, Vice President Product Experience, Adobe
“Adobe is realizing they no longer have to focus solely on selling high-performance tools.” -Michael Gough, Vice President Product Experience, Adobe
“Enjoyability replaces usability. We’re all in the fashion industry.” -Michael Gough, Vice President Product Experience, Adobe
“You should have to spend less time training and more time doing.” -Michael Gough, Vice President Product Experience, Adobe
“The biggest problem in teaching particular lessons: the gaps. Online tools can fill in those gaps. 90% of students learn 90% of the material. There’s that missing 10% and it’s never the same 10%.” -Michael Gough, Vice President Product Experience, Adobe
“Everyone wants to innovate. But it’s better to be the best at what you do.” -Michael Gough, Vice President Product Experience, Adobe
“Designers have a way of thinking that’s called abduction. Imagine how you want something to work then start applying logic. Don’t just immediately start with what you CAN do versus what you CAN’T, etc.” -Michael Gough, Vice President Product Experience, Adobe
“There’s a big urging to have specialized skills. Those are for insects. We want creative thinkers who know how to mesh multiple ideas together.” -Michael Gough, Vice President Product Experience, Adobe
“Learn from the best and then copy them.” -Michael Gough, Vice President Product Experience, Adobe
One of the biggest issues in innovation: “you have to be sure you’re solving the right problem.” -Michael Gough, Vice President Product Experience, Adobe
“Our software is going to crash.” -Michael Gough, Vice President Product Experience, Adobe
“When you use crowd-sourcing, you sometimes get American Idol and that’s not always the best. So you should use it as one tool in your arsenal. Not as the be-all, end-all.” -Michael Gough, Vice President Product Experience, Adobe
“HTML5 is being completely embraced by Adobe.” -Ann Lewnes, Senior Vice President Corporate Marketing
“Schools have solved the same issue 100s of times. Why not connect them together to share resources?” -Ann Lewnes, Senior Vice President Corporate Marketing
“We’re not going to have a solution for everyone. It’s going to be a bunch of different tools.” -Tacy Trowbridge, Group Manager Worldwide Education, Adobe
“I’m only now getting requests to start building apps for individual books from publishers. They’ve been quite slow to adopt the iPad.” -Robin Mitchell-Cranfield, Vancouver Film School
