Digital Compass

The Internet has changed how we do just about everything. Buy groceries, do our banking, find spouses and entertain ourselves. It's also changed how a lot of service professionals now have to do business. When we used to want to learn a new skill, find tutoring for our child or even learn to play guitar we would find a local teacher, business or check the yellow pages for lessons. Not so today, websites have often replaced the individual instructor. It's more convenient for the student and most of the time cheaper.

Let's just look for a moment at how someone would learn to play guitar say 15 years ago before the Internet and the multitude of options available today.

You had two options before the web came along to learn guitar. One, you could go to your local music school or find a private instructor that gave lessons from their home. Each lesson would be $10-$15 bucks a session and you'd usually come once a week, practice the remaining six days an come back the following week.

The second alternative was to purchase one of the teach yourself guitar books or VHS videos. This was a bit more difficult since you didn't have the direct interaction with someone but it was doable if you had the determination to learn.

Today those books have been replaced with websites that can be updated faster and offer you far more information then a $15 book ever could. The VHS videos are now guitar instruction dvds, and usually not just one but a set with months worth of content to learn from.

So then what has happened to the guitar teacher who used to teach from their basement on week nights and weekends? They're still around because some students still want the interaction. How ever there are fewer and fewer students that are looking for their services now.

A few of these individuals saw the writing on the wall and made a change to their business. Instead of looking for students to charge $15 an hour to they decide to make their own guitar lesson series on dvd.

By taking their knowledge about the guitar and converting it into a digital format on DVD or a website they suddenly had a wider audience to sell their lessons to and didn't have to spend every night doing it.

While technology has changed the way we do a lot of things this example of learning to play guitar shows that it has helped not just students adapt but also the teachers. While unfortunately not as many teachers make the transition as students the lucky few that do will enjoy the fruits of their labour.