Stephen Downes

Audrey Watters asks the right question here, and after spending 25 years working in a government research organization I can confidently state the answer: whoever will pay for it. Because that's the focus, right? The way we've set up our economy as a whole: the product is designed for the customers, and the customers are those who pay the bill, which is why social media and television are designed for advertisers, and edtech is designed for institutions, governments and enterprises. Now Watters asks this in the context of Anthropic's announcement of 'Claude for Teachers', asking "why bypass district decision-making and district governance" and market directly to teachers? The answer is, they're not marketing to teachers; they're still marketing to the boards and institutions that will pay for the software. Because while edtech (including Claude for Teachers) should be designed for students, or maybe teachers, the main lesson I learned in those 25 years is that there is no market for that.