Power to the People! We can literally take power into our own hands with the advent of new innovations.

Gas prices are going down. That's not a particularly unique observation. Many of us know that the gas prices in the United States have plummeted recently. Here's a novel idea: these gas prices have gone down because there is less demand.
With the advent of more efficient and eco-friendly vehicles the demand for gas has diminished. That paired with the fact that supply was increased when more drilling occurred in the United States caused the lower prices. I think that in the United States demand decreased, supply increased, and the prices followed the laws of economics and decreased. Here is the important thing to learn from this phenomenon: we as consumers impacted that reality. The corporations could not change the fact that when our habits of buying large quantities of gas decreased, then the value of their product also decreased. Look at how much power we have! I saw that the direction that gas prices were going, and as soon as I had the opportunity to live in town and walk to schools and grocery stores I took it. I saw how trends were going, gas prices were going up, my income was certainly not increasing, so in order to just keep surviving I planned that as a back up plan I would just walk everywhere if I ever couldn't afford to drive. I ended up not being able to afford the upkeep of my car for a while, so I decided to walk or take public transportation while I saved money for fixing my car. The result was that I learned it was possible. I could live for months at a time without a car, and this saved me money on gas as well. We can make a difference by buying cars that don't use gas, if we can afford that option, or by walking and taking public transportation if possible. This helps us to take our lives and our future into our own hands. We can do it. Yes we can. 
Here's a link to a guide to more eco-friendly cars:  http://www.ecolivingexperts.com/eco-friendly-cars/

Steven Pinker: The surprising decline in violence

Technology has made the world smaller, and it will eventually allow us
to (or has allowed us to) enjoy the benefits of cooperation in a way that is
more accessible to more people than ever. Here Steven Pinker talks about the surprising
decline in violence among humans, and urges us to focus on some of the
things we are doing right in society. I think this is really important.

Why Technology is the Most Important Factor in the Success of Schools Today

So with the advent of so much technology, many parents fear that technology is stunting learning. Some researchers are finding the opposite to be true. Do students really learn better when using technology and online tools? The recent scientific research and theories on best learning practices are evidence for several convincing arguments that students, in fact, do learn better with the aid of technology. Learning supported with online technology is the answer to the problem of a homogenized educational curriculum that we saw as a result of people in education responding in a very uncreative way to the requirements for meeting state and federal standards. It is a widely recognized fact that what was once our U.S. schools one-size-fits-all approach to learning is now outdated. In order to bring schools into the realm that most students are already existing in today, a realm that is dominated by the use of online tools and technologies, we need to acknowledge the power that online learning brings to the learning process. Online learning and access to new technologies simply makes the classroom more student centered (Clark, 2008). If we were to ask students what they think about implementing technologies in the classroom in order to maximize learning, according to the CDW 21st-Century Classroom Report (2011), 94 % of students say that they believe that using technology to hone and develop their skills will maximize their opportunities for success in the future. The statistics for teachers that believe this to be true is less than half of that figure (CDW Government LLC ). Technologies in the classroom are compared to disruptive innovations in the marketplace by Professor C. Christensen (2008). Disruptive innovations in the marketplace is a term coined to explain important, complex innovations that provide services or products that were once so expensive that they were only available to a few elite customers available to almost everyone. According to Christensen in his book “Disrupting Class” (2008), technology is the disruptive innovation in the education sector that will change the way that educators approach learning forever. With all of this in mind embracing technology and online learning tools as the best way to reach all students is the logical next step for visionary educators.

Resources

CDW Government LLC (2011). The 2011 CDW-G 21st-Century Classroom Report. Vernon Hills, Il: CDW-G. Retrieved August 8, 2014 @ http://newsroom.cdw.com/features/feature-06-28-10.html

Christensen, C. M., Horn, M. B., & Johnson, C. W. (2008). Disrupting Class. New York: McGraw Hill.

Clark, T. (2008). Online Learning: Pure Potential. Educational Leadership, Reshaping High Schools,65(8). Retrieved July 31, 2014 @ 

http://www.blackboard.com/resources/k12/ASCD_Online_Learning_Pure_Potential.pdf

UDL At A Glance: this is a great video to introduce or further familiarize teachers with Universal Design for Learning.

Gutiérrez: We can have law and order and justice and compassion

This is a very, very good man who explains the problem and what we need to do to humanize our system. He speaks from his heart. God bless him. Watch this speech, please, and understand what he says: " We can have law and order and justice and compassion" (Congressman Gutierrez, 2014).

The Outernet Just Might be the Answer!

Although the Internet has made access to information potentially accessible to more people, emerging technologies have also created a digital divide between economic classes in our society (Laureate, 2009).  Emerging technologies have created a digital divide between economic classes in our society (Laureate, 2009). This same sentiment is expressed in the sentence, “The future has arrived; it just wasn't distributed equally” (Gibson, W n.d.; Kennedy, 01, 12, 2012).

So how can we, as educational leaders, help narrow that divide? Well, the answer is that we need to help make technologies more accessible to everyone while providing an income for those that work in the technology industry. Dr. Elliot Soloway (2009) suggests that profits are now going to be made by disruptors in the industry who understand that the money to be made will be through providing services for the consumer, no longer by providing purchasable items (such as bits of software) (Laureate, 2009).

Metcalf's Law is the law that the power of the network increases by the number of people involved squared. As technology leaders, then, it stand to reason, we want to keep as many people involved in the Internet as possible. The value of our network is found in its global reach. One way that access is becoming more available to more people is that Smart phone sales are growing globally. Right now Smart phones are the future of technology. The Smart phone provides opportunities for the average person in ways that have the potential to narrow the technology gap. (Laureate, 2009).

Another way that the growing divide could continue to be widened if we, as technology leaders, allow it to is that the Internet may no longer remain neutral. What this means is, the FCC may cave to pressure to allow for companies to pay for faster Internet services, making the Internet less neutral. Right now almost anyone can access the Internet for a small monthly fee, and no one is given priority for faster service. If the FCC passes what the FCC calls, in a strange Orwellian double-speak term, new “net neutrality” rules there is a possibility that the rich corporations will have access to an Internet fast-lane, while the rest of us normal folk will be left out (Selyukh, 2014). This has the potential weaken the positive global effect that our current Internet has had in making information more equally accessible to all, in a way that is more more prevalent than ever before.

The disruptors, the technology leaders, the inventors, and the innovation champions are already looking for ways to counteract any form of censorship or special rights for certain groups that could occur through FCC regulations and financial strong-holds on the Internet. There is now an “Outernet” in the works that would allow for free access to all of humanity through WiFi from space, despite attempts to close down the openness we now enjoy on the Internet (Outernet, n.d.. @ https://www.outernet.is/). We can, and should -as technology leaders-, develop U.S. and global policies to protect this, and we can encourage all citizens to exercise their voice and speak up for their right to access to information.

References

Laureate Education, Inc. (2009). Emerging and future technology: Diversity and globalism. Baltimore, MD: Author.

Outernet (n.d.) @ https://www.outernet.is/

Kennedy, P. (01/13/2012) William Gibson's future is Now. The New York Times. @ http://www.nytimes.com/2012/01/15/books/review/distrust-that-particular-flavor-by-william-gibson-book-review.html?pagewanted=all&_r=0

Selyukh, A. (May 15, 2014). Amid protests, U.S. FCC proposes new 'net neutrality' rules. Reuters, WA @ http://www.reuters.com/article/2014/05/15/us-usa-internet-neutrality-idUSBREA4C0SF20140515

Wired. (2014-05-02 18:45 UTC). Outernet: A space-based alternative Internet designed to evade censorship. Interactivity will be limited (no uploads). @ http://hiw.me/WIRED/status/462301794304282626

Red Queens: DVDs and Video-on-demand technologies

One competitive force behind emerging technologies is the the "Red Queen," based on Lewis Carol's character from Through the Looking Glass (Thornburg, 2008c). An emergent Red Queen has an undeniable and obvious impact on the evolution of technology, because of the fierce competition between technologies. The consequence of a fierce battle between two Red Queen technologies; each one racing to keep ahead of the other, results in the other similar technologies becoming obsolete (Laureate, 2009).

When I needed to find a way to view the movie based on a Philip K. Dick book, A Scanner Darkly, I was able to find a vendor that offered this service to me for free, on demand. This current competition between DVDs and video-on-demand is an example of a Red Queen rivalry. When Video-on-demand became available to the public, all of Blockbluster Video Outlets open as retail rental outlets for DVD rental and purchase were put out of business, they are all literally closed directly due to the availability of Video-on-demand technology. This shows that DVDs and Video-on-demand are Red Queens, based on Thornburg's definition (2008c).

According to McLuhan’s tetrad (2008b), Videos-on demand enhance current technologies because it accelerates accessibility, improves price, and convenience to the consumer. It obsoletes rental video stores available for rental as physical retail outlets, retrieves the access to programming once available from your living room when televisions were first invented, and could be replaced in the future by a wild card technology not currently in existence, thus reversing the enhancing features that it originally introduced.

References

Laureate Education, Inc. (2009). Emerging and future technology. Baltimore, MD: Author.

Thornburg, D. D. (2008b). Emerging technologies and McLuhan's Laws of Media. Lake Barrington, IL: Thornburg Center for Space Exploration.

Thornburg, D. (2008c). Red Queens, butterflies, and strange attractors: Imperfect lenses into emergent technologies. Lake Barrington, IL: Thornburg Center for Space Exploration.