Big companies and the motives for free

People working in education likely fail to appreciate the amount of money that is involved. Personnel costs are immense, but this reality is overlooked because individual salaries are low. The process of education requires a variety of goods and services (my topic) - educational resources including technology, Internet access, management software, professional development, and even the cost of conference participation. Yes, even sending school personnel to a conference such as ISTE is a sizeable investment. No denying there is big money to be made.

I am not suggesting that anyone should propose we do education on the cheap. All involved in any facet of the enterprise must receive a reasonable return on their time and commitment of skills. I emphasize ALL here. Even those involved may expect that others contribute with little or no return. I agree with Gary Stager on this issue  (emphasis on the specificity of my agreement).

There is a different perspective. Some large companies are willing to provide resources at no or very low cost. This type of commitment has received recognition and encouragement from Department of Education Technology’s “Go Open” initiative.  I am not certain what I think of such programs. At a gut level I distrust such commitments. I assume there must be a motive that is typically not acknowledged and whatever funds are required must come from somewhere. I also question the match between what is offered and what is needed.

Why are free or low-cost goods or services likely to be available? Here is a list that applies in at least some cases. It is not always clear when which motives apply.

Motives

• Ads - traditional model for free or low-cost resources (newspapers, web content)
• Collection of information that can be sold or used (store loyalty cards, many Internet companies)
• Access to community (music streaming to encourage concert attendance, blogging to encourage paid presentation fees)
• Brand loyalty - inexpensive tech equipment to encourage later purchases
• Good will is good publicity

Obviously, schools recognize at least some of these motives. Sometimes there are reasons schools are unwilling to accept (ads and data collection from those under 18 would be examples). For example, the Google school programs do not present ads and limit public exposure of students acknowledging that some commercial motives will not be tolerated.  We pretty much reject certain motives directed at the young we tolerate for older individuals because we question the ability of the young to understand when such motives are present. I sometimes wonder if such awareness is as age-limited as we assume.

In keeping with my belief that we must support those offering services and resources, I find the incentives to the providers to be acceptable as long as the motives are known by all involved. 

The one issue that does concern me in the way providers are now committing to “Go Free” concerns what is being offered. Many commitments seem to be existing services that are either already free or are scaled to include educators or students. So the services Google offers to students are already available to you and me at no cost (ignoring the ads, data collection, etc). Google has layered a very useful management system on top of these services and limited the application of revenue streams (ads). The financial hit here is in the commitment to develop and maintain the management systems. Scaling the infrastructure a bit is not a big deal for a company this immense. Still, the tools provided have important educational applications and these tools would be worth paying for.

The commitments I presently find less significant are those that organize and serve the resources developed by others. Amazon Inspire strikes me as falling into this category. I agree that locating resources can be a challenge, but this is what educator sharing already provides to those educators who are tied into a PLN. The content is the challenge. I would be far more impressed if Amazon would waive its 30% on educational content provided through schools or universities.

Singling out Amazon is not fair and we all should appreciate the effort. I am just indicating what I think are the greatest actual needs. I kind of have a similar reaction to the efforts of the Department of Educational Technology. I don’t see organizing resources or services to be the main problem and I do not think encouraging free is a good long term solution. I would be more supportive of the Department offering commissions or subsidies for the development and deployment of relevant services and resources. This type of “grant” program is the way research is supported in higher education. The assumption, I think, is that the competition encourages quality and compensates the productive.