Unless you live in a country with no mobile coverage, it would be difficult to miss the Pokemon Go phenomenon. Currently only available in certain countries, with NZ being in the list to be first up in being able to access the app. For iOS and Android and thankfully not yet on Windows, as I would be tempted to give is a go!
In NZ the local media has surely gone over the top reporting summaries of the craze, providing warnings, tips and even one for people who will have no idea what it is all about!
While out for dinner with my 'kids' on Saturday, I found both plus partners have downloaded the app, although only one has succumbed (so far) to start playing. They are all in their late 20s / early 30s and would have been in mid-childhood when the original Pokemon phase began. My involvement then was the parent who had to shell out $$ to finance the acquisition of various aspects of the game and to mediate when things got rougher than usual as squabbles over Pokemon trading cards occasionally boiled over. I can see what a marketing coup the app is with an already present population of Pokemon knowledgeable users from the mid-thirties downwards.
The good thing is that most people will now find out about augmented reality and where it might be useful beyond gaming. AR is not new in education, see Hongkiat 2013 blog, and emergingtrends 2013 plus some more recent blogs - edsurge and teachthought. As always, it needs to be - what is the learning outcome from using AR? that is top most in implementing AR. My take from all the excitement. Good to see wide coverage of AR to raise it's profile. There is a need to leverage off all the AR apps that are out there already. Main challenge at present is that many are OS dependent and hardly any will run on Windows RTs :( however, with the increased realisation of the potential of AR, more apps will no doubt be developed and more contextualised AR apps may come about e.g this one developed in Spain for "car painting" and ARstudio developed in Australia.
No comments:
Post a Comment