I’m thrilled to announce that I’ve joined instaGrok. This post is long overdue—I came aboard a few months back—but I remain awed by the possibilities of what we’re doing, and the grind of Getting Things Done hasn’t taken that away.
What does instaGrok do?
instaGrok is a research engine for learning and sharing: Users explore graphical concept maps that show how ideas connect. They can also customize the maps (with key facts, links, and images) and pass them on to friends. As Pinterest changed how we curate and share photos, instaGrok will do the same for what we learn.
For those of you who are mathematically inclined:
instaGrok =
(Google – Links + Concept Maps) *
(Pinterest – “Keep Calm and Carry On”)
So it’s not a search engine?
Nope. Search engines just give you links, so it’s up to you to read a bunch of pages and figure out how concepts relate. instaGrok scans all the pages you would’ve gotten as search results, and then it builds a concept map of the important ideas.
Can I try it out?
Sure. It’s open to the public, and we’re getting tons of users. Here’s a concept map on the American Dream that I made in a minute or so.
Who is it for?
K-12 education is our first market. However, we think instaGrok will be useful for everybody who uses the internet to learn (a.k.a. all of us).
Doesn’t Wikipedia cover this?
We respectfully disagree:
- Wikipedia is linear. There’s no adaptivity or interactivity. You can’t zoom in to focus on a particular topic.
- Wikipedia doesn’t know if you’re a beginner or an expert. Check out the introduction to the article on Gravity. “Curvature of spacetime“, anyone?
- You can’t customize a Wikipedia entry and pass it on to a friend, saying, “Here is what I think is important about this topic.”
What’s your role?
We’re a small team, and inevitably everyone does a little bit of everything. Somehow that ends up being terribly unglamorous.
Awesome! How can I help?
- Try it out.
- Tell us what you think.
- Tell your friends—especially friends who are educators—and help spread the word.
Sputnik 11 