XplanaZine

Well, the wires were hot with the big news over the weekend — Pyra is being purchased by Google. What, you say? What or who is Pyra? They’re the people who run Blogger and who have also been big players in blogging’s rise to prominence.

Why is this significant for education? A couple of reasons. First, blogging is one of the most promising solutions for blowing away the learning curve long associated with Web publishing. It’s a simple, I-don’t-have-to-understand-any-technology process that allows anyone to write freely and spontaneously on the Web. This is a big step towards eliminating the gap between teachers and students in terms of technology. Moreover, blogging is also one of the best communication tools going for teachers and classes. A good blog not only features current entries, but also has an archive of past posts, as well as a calendar and often a place where others can respond. Blogs are instant Web pages and instant community. Two things education is looking for on the Web.

Google’s purchase of Pyra and Blogger is significant because it will add more money for research and development, and it will provide even more legitimacy for the technology. This means more features, more robust architectures, and even easier use.

The only potential problem with the purchase is that it puts Google in a potentially awkward position in terms of its service as a search engine to Blogger’s competitors. Users of MoveableType, Radio Userland, and LiveJournal all post their pages to Google for searching. This means that Google will need to be careful in how its non-search operations are kept separate from its core search business (at least in perception).

On the other hand, it is indeed fun to imagine what the power of blogging might become with such a strong partnership and with Google’s vision for simple yet powerful technology. The bottom live is that education wins and we should start seeing some new developments in the blogging community as a result.