Multimedia educational software: A radical new era for software design and authorship

Abstract

THE DAYS are over for software authors being able to design and program text-based educational software adorned with a few simple graphics. Multimedia and video technology advances virtually mandate use of video imagery for present and future software projects, thus introducing the need for complex team authorship and Hollywoodesque production considerations. The author mourns the passage but describes award-winning EDUCOM multivideo projects showing how colleges and schools can play a key role in software development, perhaps preventing a slide into mass market ultra-slickness so often associated with commercial television productions. But the transition will be expensive and require authors to be multitalented, team players in an arena once dominated by inventive loners working on bare-bones equipment in cluttered offices and garages.