In my Tuesday morning post about Apple Announcement Day I highlighted the importance of the digital media cultural experience that surrounds an Apple event. And that, even if you don’t care about the products, you should be a little interested in how social media and new streaming technologies surround the event. But before I go into that, let me address the obvious.

The event has come and gone. The Apple haters are out in full force. No more rumors. We now have confirmation of the iPhone 6 in 2 larger sizes…AND a wearable. Yes, it has a time feature. But it’s not a watch, despite the name.  Much like the iPhone is not a phone, but it has a phone call feature. But I digress.

Apple.com/live got very little press as it was overshadowed by the product announcement.  But this was Apple’s first attempt at live streaming their own event, as well as posting images with Pinterest-style design, publishing as fast as a live blogger, and including share buttons to Facebook, Twitter, Pinterest, and Tumblr. They were able to deliver behind the scenes images and information that live bloggers could not and since they didn’t need to be stealthy about it, they could use real camera equipment and setup beautiful images to represent their event.

This is the new world of social marketing that will soon become the new world of informal learning. Imagine Tim Cook, and the cast of presenters, as if they were teaching a course. Is there any reason why this exact setup would not work? Or simply because it’s a “course”, would the same attention to detail be dismissed as not necessary for a “training event”?

Before you dismiss that image from your brain too quickly, hold onto it for one more thought. Replace Tim Cook with Richard Feynman and his lectures on physics.  Would you consider THAT important enough to apply the Apple.com/live treatment? Or even more? Why, or why not?

You don’t need to answer that.  You just need to think about it. Every major cultural event is getting the social media treatment these days. And yet education and training remains very…well…UN-social. We use social media to create, and engage in, the cultural social experience around television shows, sporting events, and yes company product releases, but not educational events. Events created with the intent of transferring knowledge should also be as highly valued, and receive the same treatment.