Apple’s university gravy-trains
p2pnet.net News View:- You tell me where you can buy a 4 gig microdrive that’s self powered, can play mp3s, recharge over USB and Firewire, store ANY type of data, includes a backlit display, and only cost $250—–THEN I WILL AGREE ITS OVERPRICED (WTF?) AND HAS NO USE FOR AN A LIST UNIVERSITY STUDENT WHO JUST *MIGHT* NEED A PORTABLE STORAGE SOLUTION, AND WOULDN’T MIND AN MP3 MUSIC PLAYER ON CAMPUS!!!! GET REAL!!! THE APPLE IPOD IS AN INEXPENSIVE, INNOVATIVE, STYLISH DEVICE WITH A LOT MORE USES THAN A GLORIFIED MP3 PLAYER. If it is so awful go buy an ugly 128 MB mp3 player that can ONLY play music (a CD or 2) for $50 less. And have fun shelling out $50 a month on batteries for it. Jeees.
That was one of the angry comments to our original story on Duke University’s decision to blow a cool half-million-dollars on iPods for students, claiming the music player represents a valuable aid to learning.
“When Kenneth Rogerson walked into his newspaper journalism class on the first day of the school year, the professor could barely contain his excitement,” says the Christian Science Monitor, going on:
“After a quick introduction he broke the big news: ‘We got the grant,’ he told his class. “You all get iPods.”
A grant to buy iPods?
“As if on cue, the students exhaled an audible ‘whoa’ and exchanged elated glances,” the post goes on. “Duke University in Durham, N.C., had already made many a headline as the first school ever to provide all incoming freshmen with their own 20-gigabyte iPods – enough space to store up to 5,000 songs.”
$500K is a bag of money, especially when, as another comment post said, “the university somehow doesn’t have enough money to fund its dining service and the Art & Sciences school is running at a deficit of $1.4 million. They can’t hire new or good profs due to lack of money but somehow they can dole out $500,000 for friggin iPods? They have no real academic purpose or use that cannot be covered by existing resources like the library and the computer network.”
Apple should be giving Duke the units for free, considering all the priceless media mileage it’s getting from the university.
But, “The thing to remember is size,” says the CSM. “A 20-gig hard drive is like having a laptop in the palm of your hand.”
And “It doesn’t shuffle through thousands of playlists – it can record audio files, capture images, store documents, and then organize them. The iPod isn’t just changing the way students take notes – it’s turning college into a realm of perpetual connectivity.
And “We want students to be able to take the professor with them wherever they go,” William Lynch, director of Drexel University’s school of education in Philadelphia, “which will hand out iPods to faculty and freshmen this fall.” is quoted as saying.
The CSM doesn’t say how much Drexel plans to spend on this ‘initiative,’ but it won’t be cheap.
And “Institutions such as Duke, Georgia College & State University, and others are using the iPod as a portable learning tool for listening to recorded lectures, foreign language study, research notes, storing files and photos, and listening to audio books and podcasts,” Greg Joswiak, Apple’s vp of iPod product marketing is quoted as saying.
Duke, Drexel and Georgia College & State
How many millions of dollars are these schools throwing at Apple for its music player? And why are they doing it?
The Duke Computer Architecture group, “performs research on a variety of topics, often in collaboration with the systems group. Our research often requires re-examining the interface between hardware and software, designing new interfaces as technology and workloads change. We have projects examining: architectures based on self-assembly of nanoscale technologies, reliable computer systems, multithreaded system design, energy efficient computing, and parallel and distributed architectures.”
Technology Commercialization at Drexel says, “Drexel University holds a unique place in higher education and research as Philadelphia’s technological university. Drexel’s Entrepreneurship & Technology Commercialization Office’s mission is to commercialize Drexel intellectual property, to bring benefit to the society and to add value to the university, inventors and the community – in addition, foster entrepreneurial spirit at the University.”
The Georgia College & State University mission statement for mass communication says, “The major in mass communication provides students with information and guidance to master the theory and practical applications of mass media. The mass communication major offers instruction in researching, writing, producing, and disseminating information through the mass media.”
If these – or any other US schools which are thinking of spending money on Apple iPod music players – so desperately need to supply students with 20-gig recorders, why don’t they launch school projects to develop them?
They could perhaps do it in competition with each other. The most useful/successful devices and associated systems and software could then be sold to schools not only in North America, but around the world, with all that implies.
Then Duke, for one, could use money it’s saving to hire a new professor or two and at the same time, it would be providing genuinely valuable, creative learning experiences for its students.
And if for some reason these and other schools which need 20-gig recorders don’t want to use in-house resources to answer their needs, they could farm design projects out to North American tech companies who’d no doubt be delighted to have the business.
This might upset Apple and its devoted followers. But it would do the schools and start-ups, perhaps, a hell of a lot of good.
Jon
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Something you think we should know? tips[at]p2pnet.net
See:-
original story – The Duke – iPod ‘initiative’, p2pnet, July 23, 2004
Christian Science Monitor – When iPod goes collegiate, April 19, 2005
April 20th, 2005 at 9:21 pm
I am sure that Apple is just tickled to death. It takes a lot of time to write up a grant application. In the past businesses such as Apple and IBM were known for donating equipment to schools for educational purposes. It was properly thought that getting them used to their particular brand would develop brand loyalty and later in life they would have a customer that would purchase their products. (and they do!) It is an investment in the future.
It seems now that just like satellite radio, the latest tend is to get you to pay for what you got for free. The corporations of the world seem to have been successful in this idea that you owe them. We see it every day or so in the actions of the RIAA, the MPAA, and many others. This unstated but implied idea that they have product and as a good little consumer you are obligated to buy the product. I couldn’t disagree more. Its my wallet, my money and they can’t force me to pull it out and spent it where I don’t want too. Spend your money as a vote for what you believe in. Those that don’t get a share will have to figure out what they are doing wrong.
April 21st, 2005 at 12:47 am
Just use a portable tape recorder. It’s cheaper. But then it’s not an iPod story and therefore not interesting and/or sexy.
April 21st, 2005 at 2:09 am
“Apple’s university gravy-trains”
Huh? Yeah, the title isn’t untrue, but its hardly at the crux of what this story is about. Is it Jon?
I think it’d be alot more informative if you were to actually do some research (i know, its easier to flail like a poorly informed cut-and-paster) and find out who initiated the absurd notion of drawing up a grant to give all student iPods.
Whilst I doubt Apple objected to the purchase, I also doubt that they initiated the entire affair. Someone at this university is a bit too smitten with the lil’ white box and made a really stupid, economically unsound decision.
“why don’t they launch school projects to develop them?”
As sweet as this notion is – cute, even – its even more economically unsound. And whilst the schools would’ve had a fabbo “make your own fully functioning DAP” project, whats the point in engaging so many learning / educational resources just to produced a product, whose engineering is really only as complex as the case is small, for an over saturated market? An idea that makes even less sense if you look at the short-sphere of manufacturing it’d go through to meet the (so-called) “demand” for iPods on these campuses.
April 21st, 2005 at 3:20 am
Gravy-train is right. There is nothing in this about education, it’s about money flowing away from us (rapidly) and into the pockets of the Universities and other businesses. It just occured to me that there are so many people up in arms about the RIAA cutting deals with Universities to use Napster, but are indifferent to what Apple has done. Isn’t it the same thing? Either get locked into using Windows and the supporting players or get locked in to using the ipod and one music store. Either way the consumers are the ones behind bars.
An iPod is nice, innovation in the classroom is even nicer, but all four sides (RIAA/Stanford et al? and Apple/Duke et al) seem to forget that students should have a choice in what they want to use when learning.
I have to agree with you that these companies and organizations have had it too good recently, to the point where they expect us to dance when they dangle any kind of carrot. It’s all beginning to wear thin.
- Nadine Edwards
April 21st, 2005 at 4:41 am
I don’t like my school fees being burdoned with unnecessary crap.
Cable tv and telephone are one thing, but ipods are not.
I’ve defended the ipod as a drm free device worth buying, but I still don’t condone the idea of tacking these things onto school fees or our taxes.
No Corporate Welfare.. none for napster.. none for apple.. none for halliburton.
April 21st, 2005 at 8:30 am
Nothing like add ons and frills to increase ones education costs. This strikes be as rather excessive and frivilous. You can be sure it will be popular but the thing about grants is that it never lasts for any great length of time. At some point it runs out.
Many of the uni’s are turning to a welfare dole of services such as Napster. Tacking this cost as a hidden one within the bill. One such student said that he asked as he didn’t want it. He found out later that it was there and he was left with no choice in whether it would be paid or not. As you can imagine he is steaming about a service he neither plans to use nor endorses being crammed into his education costs.
This is nothing but welfare for the corporation at student and family cost.
So are we teaching our students to now be good little consumers? Are we teaching families how to scrimp and save for twenty years to help pay big musics tab?
It was just such actions as hidden and excessive taxes that started this country in the first place. I refer you to the Boston Tea Party.
April 21st, 2005 at 1:12 pm
Everyone here is missing the point. The big private Universities (e.g. Duke) are in intense competition for excellent students who are also able to afford ~$50k / year (tuition + books + living expenses). Giving students an ipod adds to attarctiveness and is a drop in the ocean compared to total costs. For Duke it is a smart move, even if the academic rationale is slim for many students.