The following rant is about how an industry designed to supply one thing (running shoes) can foster inequality amongst the practitioners (runners). I find many parallels in higher education, especially with practitioners of bespoke pedagogies that work only for fewer than 45 total students a semester and education technology companies that sell expensive software of marginal use to students.
There is a running boom in the U.S., the result of closed gyms and stir-crazy athletes in need of a fix. At the same time, running shoe companies are in an arms race to produce the fastest marathon shoes. These expensive shoes are like race cars: they are designed for elites and regular users can hurt themselves if used inappropriately.
With new technologies to tout, shoe companies are increasing their prices. The MSRP price of the big-tent shoe for most companies (the equivalent of a family sedan like the Camry) has increased to $130 from $120. Most of the new elite shoes with claimed high-speed technology sell for more than $180, up to $250, though durability is generally low.
Meanwhile, the move to online shopping has forced independent running shops to spin up websites, quickly. In my city, several local running stores hired the same company to code their websites, with terrible results. Load times are glacial, search features are out of 2001, and the filtering capabilities are. . . odd. They give people the options of "responsive, balanced, or plush" for ride. 30 year of running, and I have no idea what I'd chose for this, and you can only chose one. The site is clearly designed to highlight fashion, not function, as scrolling over the shoes shows you other colors, not specs or an alternate view (say the sole).
As independent running shops are struggling to adjust to their new business reality, the running shoe companies themselves are dumping more shoes online, through their Amazon connections, and pricing the shoes below what the independent shops can afford to offer. I recently found some Mizuno shoes -sold by Mizuno on Amazon- for $70 less than at my local shop. Amazon has terrible labor policies, so I use them as little as possible, but I get why folks make the choice to buy the same shoe for less.
Who do the new technologies and higher prices benefit? Mostly the shoe companies, Amazon, and the very rich and very fast runners. Imagine if someone claimed a new knife would allow you to cook far tastier dinner than before: you'd laugh right? Very few of us are limited by the cutting technology we use in our culinary efforts. It's our time, our abilities, what we're willing to put into an effort that shape our outcomes. The claims that new shoes will make us faster is a lie. If you increased your sleep by 4% a night, you'd have better results than buying new shoes.
Thankfully, there are some countervailing forces. One prominent shoe review site has called out the lie of claims on the Nike Air Zoom Alphafly NEXT% as marketing crap. More shoes sites are regularly listing affordable running shoes, acknowledging that the price-wars to the top haven't yielded shoes that serve most runners. These are positive developments. I doubt we'll see shoe companies to offer their excess stock to independent running shoe companies instead of dumping it on Amazon.
This rant is about running shoes, but we see many of the same trends in higher education. Ed tech, such as TurnItIn and proctoring software, claim to be solving problems, but are really just the equivalent of a price increase for college students. Most of the claimed innovations in digital communication (Zoom, MS Teams) primarily benefit rich students, who can afford fast internet connections on powerful computers. Most students do better with the equivalent of a phone call, perhaps sharing a screen shot at times. Much as with shoes, advances in technology and the structure of the industry are not benefiting most practitioners. Time will tell whether higher ed or runners can push back these trends.
