Let the Looting Begin

The Gray Lady has noticed that Silicon Valley is looking to education as a new profit center.

The article itself is rather adulatory of such efforts, rather unsurprising given the New York Times' predilection for the financialization of pretty much everything, but I am not so sanguine:

The education technology business is chock-full of fledgling companies whose innovative ideas have not yet proved effective — or profitable. But that is not slowing investors, who are pouring money into ventures as diverse as free classroom-management apps for teachers and foreign language lessons for adult learners.

Venture and equity financing for ed tech companies soared to nearly $1.87 billion last year, up 55 percent from the year before, according to a new report from CB Insights, a venture capital database. The figures are the highest since CB Insights began covering the industry in 2009.

………

“Education is one of the last industries to be touched by Internet technology, and we’re seeing a lot of catch-up going on,” said Betsy Corcoran, the chief executive of EdSurge, an industry news service and research company. “We’re starting to see more classical investors — the Kleiner Perkinses, the Andreessen Horowitzes, the Sequoias — pay more attention to the marketplace than before.”

Translation: There's public taxpayer money in them there hills.

And then we have this pearl:

“I think there are businesses that won’t be able to cross that bridge,” said Michael Moe, chief executive of GSV Capital, a venture capital firm. “But if you monetize 2 to 20 percent of the network, there’s no reason it can’t work in education.”

Yes, let's all of us f%$# our children so that you can buy a vacation house in the Hamptons.

Not enough bullets.