While sort of cheesy sounding, this post on Social Media Today strikes a chord with me, and resonates with another lengthy argument Ze Frank is making in this post (which is totally worth the read). Talking about success in the 21st century, we don't just talk about innovation, and we don't just talk about having more access to information than other people. We talk about people who are completely and totally engaged in their jobs.

As Augie Ray puts it, "Passionate people are committed not because they get a paycheck but because they believe in what they do; passionate people don't keep their skills up to date because they are told to but because standing still simply is not an option; and passionate people are driven by what they possess inside rather than what happens around them. Passionate people see things others do not, stretch to get the job done, are more willing to embrace risks, and are their own harshest critics."

And I think this is what digital natives are seeing that Ze Frank finds it so hard to understand: old systems of education don't matter if you already know what you want to do and how to do it. What school (especially university) teaches is how to use and interpret data: how to analyze complex information in new ways, and how to gain access to knowledge effectively. For people who already have a passion or a goal, this isn't always necessary; because they already have a direction, they will find the information they need to know by hook or by crook. Information is a tool like any other for a digital native, not the end goal.