Page 423 - Encyclopedia of Business and Finance

eobf_I 7/5/06 3:04 PM Page 400

Interactive Technology

from Amazon.com, for example, the more information
about that consumer’s reading tastes is acquired. This
information is used immediately to update that buyer’s
“Recommended Reading List.” This is critical; many sales
are lost due to the lag time between the request for infor-
mation and its provision.
Second, the information gathered is more specific,
since the branching of questions can be as detailed as the
marketer wishes. For example, if an initial set of questions
asks the viewer to input his or her age and number of chil-
dren, the next set of questions derives from the answer to
the first, and so on. When this information is used to
enhance a marketing database, marketers are able to
respond to the individual needs of viewers, taking one-to-
one marketing to its limits.

Gathering information. Interactive documents add value
to traditional methods. Surveys that attempt to gauge sat-
isfaction with expectations of, and responses to, new
products can be more effective when done with interactive
multimedia. In the previous example, Amazon.com would
have more reliable information about a consumer’s selec-
tions than it would have from any paper survey it might
ask the public to complete. These surveys may gather
more information by being more interesting than the
Marshall McLuhan (1911–1980). Writer, educator and paper alternatives. Once you get used to this sort of sys-
pionering communications therorist, Marshall McLuhan coined tem, you find that being able to look at information in
the phrase “The medium is the message.” © BETTMANN/CORBIS different ways makes the information more valuable. The
flexibility invites exploration, and the exploration is
rewarded with discovery.
help the student overcome a particular misunderstanding.
As a result, students should be less apprehensive about for- INTERACTIVITY IS COOL
mal tests, and such tests should contain fewer surprises, Using Marshall McLuhan’s classic distinction between
because ongoing self-quizzing gives a better sense of where “hot” and “cool” media can make both the prospects and
we stand. problems of interactivity clearer. In Understanding the
Interactivity is the key to successful online learning. Media, McLuhan (1964) explained that “a hot medium is
Yet a survey of online instructional materials reveals a sur- one that extends one single sense in ‘high definition.’
prising deficiency in educational interactive programs, for High definition is the state of being well-filled with data”
three reasons: (1) cyber-courses are largely a combination (p. 22). A cool medium, by contrast, is one in which “lit-
of conventional classroom and textbook material, neither tle is given and so much has to be filled in” (p. 23).
of which are conducive to interactivity; (2) instructors McLuhan was primarily interested in the media them-
tend to think of interactivity primarily as a means of selves, and had little to say about that process of “filling
assessment, instead of learning; (3) the concept itself is in”—what today is called interactivity.
extended to cover everything from navigational buttons to Learning is “cool” as a measure of the individual’s
chatrooms to online games. involvement in the medium. One can easily recognize the
difference between “hot” mindlessness of channel surfing
Marketing. Interactive technology has two distinct advan- and the “cool” absorption and involvement of learning.
tages over traditional means of gathering consumer data. The challenge, then, is not only to produce a “cool” digi-
First, it allows the information to be gathered in real time, tal medium in which learning can take place, but to do so
and therefore the response to the customer can be more despite use of a screen that may remind us of television
timely than with traditional media. The more one orders and the uninvolved behavior patterns it induces. The key

400 ENCYCLOPEDIA OF BUSINESS AND FINANCE, SECOND EDITION