At the end of every academic year, Ryerson University hosts a conference that addresses education. The conference theme this year was teaching today’s learners. Two ideas dawned on me during the day that I thought were relevant to our readers. Stephen Lewis, a man of many credentials — politician, diplomat, humanitarian, and educator – spurred the first. He is arguably one of Canada’s best public speakers. He talked to us about the struggles faced by people infected with HIV/AIDS in Africa. While the content of the talk was serious, he also made us laugh here and there to brighten things up. At the conclusion of the talk, one of the conference attendees asked Mr. Lewis how he was able to cope with the amount of tragedy he saw first-hand, and continue to be so light-hearted. He explained that people in Africa are fighting very hard and being brave. As such, he felt that it would almost feel self-indulgent to feel sad, and not rise to the occasion as well. I thought that this was a wonderful way to think about turmoil of any kind. It’s a bit far fetched to compare the AIDS epidemic to the printing industry. However, I thought that if you are the one fighting in your company to be innovative and provide creative solutions, then you are more likely to be joined by others who will want to do the same.
I also had the opportunity to attend the Digital Print Forum in Toronto. The forum is organized by INTERQUEST, a research and consulting firm in the field of digital print and publishing. This was an incredibly engaging and informative event that I thoroughly recommend to those interested in digital print. If you are a Twitter user, you can check out some of the live conversation using the #digiforum hash tag. We will also post a summary of the day’s events on our website.
Interestingly, Quick Response (QR) codes were one of the technologies frequently mentioned at the forum. Everyone in the room was quite engaged by the topic and seemed to know at least a bit about the technology. Just a year or two ago that familiarity would not have been present. Many experts feel that the next technology that uses print to interactively engage people is Augmented Reality (AR). This month, Diana Brown will tell you all about AR and its applications, so that you can be just a bit ahead of the curve.
This brings me back to the second insight I had at the teaching conference. While teachers are learning how to educate today’s students, employers, too, will need to make adjustments. Generally, I think printers are beginning to understand that they need to be increasingly nimble and receptive to new technologies (that young people are often already immersed in). I hope this month’s issue will help you think about some of the value in various technologies of the future.
