Thinking Long Term in the Mac vs PC Debate

Over the years, a big fuss has been made over Apple vs. PC. There have been ad campaigns, chat room arguments and many a nerd fight dedicated to this argument. It has historically been a polarizing topic among the average user as well as the super geek. Although it seems this is yet another modern war that will never end, I am here to tell you, it's already over. 

At this point, many readers have already tuned me out, but if you are an educator who wants to innovate in a meaningful way, I suggest you keep reading. 

The tech world is currently shifting in an interesting way. Over the past few years, hardware has become less important. Many may wonder how hardware is unimportant when there is a tablet battle raging right now. If you look closely, an emphasis has been placed on cloud computing. Most people see this as a way for big companies like Microsoft and Apple to lock you into their products long term, but companies like Google and Amazon are making it easy for people to work and play cross platform. 

The school I work at currently uses google docs to create, edit and present information cross platform. Although it is not a perfect program, it is clear that it has great potential to bridge the gap between the apple and pc camps. As schools and organizations seek to streamline their technology, cloud services such as google docs will blaze the trail. In order for educators to stay ahead of the curve in technology, it is of great importance to push through the imperfections of current technology to help build solutions for the future. 

If teachers will commit to using programs such as google docs it also has the potential to diminish the socio-economic gap that exists in education. Schools and families with less resources available to them could grasp similar or equal functionality with their technology as those families with greater resources. Educators have always worked to close the gap between lower and upper classes and this technology is the way educators will accomplish this task in the future.

So, from one educator to another, I ask that you get your head out of  Apple or PC and into the clouds.