When you sign up, OpenTeams assigns you to what they call a “space”, which is simply a group of other OpenTeams users. At default you may be assigned to two spaces: one being a “domain space” and another being an “invitation-only space”. When I signed up, OpenTeams created a space for every user that has solutionwatch.com in their email address. This allows me to collaborate with only users associated with Solution Watch. OpenTeams also assigned me to the space, “OpenTeams User Community,” which is an invitation-only space where every OpenTeams user can collaborate and share (or in its current state, test). I can also go ahead and create my own spaces and provide access to only the people I choose to invite.

Once you are in a space, OpenTeams allows you to collaborate with four main types of content: initiatives, cPages, briefings, and profiles. Strange naming, I know. I even ended up using the help section just to learn what each content type is for. As it turns out, they are just as they sound: initiatives are like folders used to keep groups of content related to a specific project together; a cPage is a basic collaborative page, or wiki page; briefings are groups of content similar to initiatives but organized in an outline form; and profiles are just user profiles that can be included in an initiative or outline.

To better understand how these content types come into play, let’s look over the interface. The interface is split into three panes. The first pane on the left is the OpenTeams navigator. The navigator provides a list of all initiatives and associated briefings, colleagues, and content tags. Each area of the navigator also allows you to associate documents to an initiative, colleague, or tag by simply dropping content on the respective area. The “List Viewer”, or middle pane, lists each relative content item and allows you to filter through all content on the site. The last pane, which is the content viewer, is where users can view a document, participate in threaded discussions, manage attachments, set tags, and even view the history of a document. It’s like a wiki, discussion board, and file manager in one.

OpenTeams allows you to add any of the four content types at any time and so getting started really depends on what you are wanting to accomplish. It’s flexible enough where you can just add content and later group the content into initiatives and outlines or the reverse for just about anything you want to share with your team. OpenTeams suggests you can even create internal blogs using initiatives with cPages, then using the List Viewer to sort the cPages by date. To get started, simply select a content type in the “fish-eye” menu at the top and create a new page. The content viewer will then minimize and a new window will appear that lets you fill in your page content and other metadata. You’ll notice OpenTeams also uses a rich text editor instead of the usual wiki markup making it easier for non-technical users to get in and collaborate.

One of my favorite features of OpenTeams is the briefing outline editor. If you have a group of cPages that you want to organize for your team, you can organize them in outline form with a briefing page making the content easier for everyone to grasp and view. OpenTeams explains that briefing pages can also be good for structuring content like slides in a presentations or listing sections in a table of contents. To use the briefing outline editor, just create a briefing and drag and drop pages into the content view. You can then indent each item you drop into the outline as needed. The editor also allows you to insert a “placeholder” item if you just want to add a simple one-liner. When the page is done, you can also drag it in an initiative folder and it will appear in the “Quick Nav Favorites” on the navigator pane.

Another great thing about OpenTeams is that every page you create gets its own discussion area, file manager, history overview, and tag cloud. What’s nice about this is that it lets you continue collaborating with users in a specific page without having to edit the original content of a page like you would a normal wiki. It also saves you from having to send emails to your team by instead using the discussion area. You can even add images and other files in a pages file manager keeping all information related to a page together.

The last thing I want to talk about is OpenTeams unique billing model. First off, OpenTeams is not free, but they do give you $42 dollars in credit to start out with. The way it works is simple, and at first it may sound pricey, but it really isn’t. OpenTeams charges 99 cents per user-login a day. So, if you were to login ten times in a given month, it would cost less than $10 dollars for that month. This way, you only get charged when you actually use the service. OpenTeams also caps the cost to $16/person a month. Additionally, if you were to stop paying for the service, you are still allowed to access your spaces, but you cannot add or edit the content.

OpenTeams is an impressive service, but is it better than a normal wiki? Yes and no. It really depends on what you need. OpenTeams’ high point is adding structure to a wiki. If you need to organize pages into folders, create outlines, track files, and work with a group of users, OpenTeams is definitely worth checking out. Otherwise, if you all you are looking for is a simple way to work collaboratively on documents, I’d say stick with a free service like Wikispaces or Google Docs.

Coventi also offers Page Roles, which consists of three ranks. First, there is the owner of a page, who obviously has all privileges and rights within the page. Next there are the authors, who are capable of commenting and revising the actual page document. Last are the reviewers, who can only comment on the document and not change any of the contents of the page. Once you have invited people to collaborate and share on a page you’ll see the “People” tab appears in the interface. The People tab tells you who has and who hasn’t read your page(s). Additionally, you also can view and change the rank of your users in this section. You’ll also notice that when you start sharing your pages, a count of revisions done to that pertaining document will appear. You’re able to compare revisions via drop down menus, making it easy to look back and/or find lost information.

Authors and Reviewers are able to comments on certain sections of a page by simply highlighting the desired word, phrase, even paragraph and selecting “Create Comment” from the pop-up menu that will appear once something has been highlighted. The user can then type out their comment in the panel to the right of the interface along with a subject. Each comment that is submitted to the page is logged as a separate “conversation” and becomes its own discussion area where other users can reply to comment that was created. When there are multiple users viewing the same document, this feature can prove very handy for narrowing down areas of the page where you might have had difficulty in, and receiving direct, valuable input from your invited group members. You are also able to filter through conversations to quickly find comments that might be currently in discussion. They also separate the conversation by “open” and “closed” to help organize comments that have be discussed already. Even though it is a group oriented applications, I thought it would’ve been nice to have the ability to highlight and comment on your own page, without inviting people.

You are able to download each of your writing pages as a Word document as well as, adversely, upload Word documents to be used in Coventi. They offer Review Options such as setting a review deadline, or asking for approval on a page. Setting a deadline is as simple as choosing the exact time you’d like your collaborators to have their reviews in by, attached with any necessary comments. Asking for approval of a page works similarly. Once you feel that you’ve finalized your draft, you can send out an approval notification to receive confirmation on your work by fellow collaborators. After getting the notification email, each user will then be able to view the page and then check off whether or not they believe it is ready or if it still needs further revisions. After each user submits their approval, all authors and the owner will be sent an email reporting their confirmation. Owners of a page are able to withdraw an approval request, if necessary. Owners, authors, and reviewers also are given the option to have any page updates email to them to keep them up-to-date with the progress of the page.

I enjoy Coventi and I plan on trying and use it for some of my future writing en devours. It functions very nicely and has some of the features that we all wished our Writeboards would have. The only picky thing I can say about Coventi, being that I’m a designer, is the design of the interface. While there is nothing exceedingly wrong with how it was laid out, I think they could have made the top navigation, main tabs, and button areas less busy. I like how the interface options and selections work, but spacing out some things couldn’t hurt to help clarify things. Nonetheless, this shouldn’t hinder anyone from trying out Coventi and what it has to offer. I’m always looking for new innovating ideas from writing applications and Coventi helped fulfilled some of mine.

Before I continue, keep in mind that Curbly is not a word, but if I were to define it to put the site into context, it would be used as an adjective describing the curb appeal an environment has. For example; “Your home is looking very curbly!” or, “This room would be much curblier if it had a new sofa,” or even, “Solution Watch looks so curbly on your web browser!”

Signing up takes just a minute and you can join as a standard Curbly user or a Curbly Pro. With both account options being free, a standard Curbly user is typically a person who has interest in making their home curbly, where Curbly Pros are those who know what it takes to make your home curblier.

Every Curbly user has their own profiles where they can post photos, blog, and create clippings, which I will discuss in just a moment. Creating a profile is easy and it’s just a matter of filling in the blanks to make it personal. You can also customize the design of your profile to better reflect who you are. If you don’t have much experience with code, you can simply choose one of the three styles they provide. I went ahead and created my own style sheet seen in use on my Curbly profile. You will also find the standard, but necessary social networking features like friend lists, profile commenting, discussions, and ways of finding people.

One thing that makes Curbly a great place is that when you make a post on your blog, not only does it show up on your profile, but also on the main page of Curbly and in a topic page that relates to your post. Outside eyes immediately see your post and you can expect your moment of fame with a comment or two soon after posting.

There are three types of content you can publish. These include writing a blog post, posting photos for others to see, and posting clippings of things around the web that interest you. There are also five different sections users can view or contribute that make up Curbly:

How To: If you are looking for a DIY (Do It Yourself) project, you can find plenty of things to do here. From building a Spaceship Table to finding the recipe for a great tasting home office.

Inspiration: Whether it’s cardboard furniture or the most awesome home theatre in the world, you will find something that inspires you to make your home look curblier.

News: If you have been waiting desperately for a sale at your favorite stores or are waiting to hear what others think about Brovo’s Top Design show, you will find the latest news in this section.

Questions: For people like me who don’t have a clue how to do something to make your environment more curbly, ask the Cubly users. You can expect some great answers and advice from Curbly Pros and standard Curbly users. You can get help with things like decorating your living room or advice on how to bend plywood so you can create that skateboard half pipe in your room that you’ve been dreaming of since 10 years old.

Talk: Feel free to say anything on your mind in the Talk section. Want to discuss the Valentines Day Google logo or brag about finding a new home? This is the place to do it.

Writing a post is simple. It even has a WYSIWYG editor allowing you to style and format your content. At first, the lack of drafts and post previewing didn’t seem so crucial. However, after adding numerous photos, headlines, and video in one of my posts, I quickly realized the growing stress leading up to the save button. After clicking “Save”, I found that my post wasn’t formated the way I anticipated. Being that I am a graphic designer, I immediately panicked after seeing it on the main page, in my blog, and in the “How to” section. Thankfully there is a “Edit” link that I used multiple times after posting until it was at it’s intended perfection. Once posted, you begin to feel like Martha Stewart’s upcoming competition. Don’t be surprised if I turn into a interior design consultant after a year of posting on Curbly instead of reviewing start-ups here at Solution Watch… hypothetically speaking of course.

You will also find a feature on Curbly called “Clippings”. Clippings let you save images and links from around the web that you can display on your profile or website for others to see. Using the Curbly bookmarklet, you can go to any site that has an image you like, click the bookmarklet, and post about it within seconds. There is even a widget for your clippings that you can place on your own website for others to see. This is one feature I immediately got addicted to. I thoroughly enjoy posting my Clippings.

Overall, Curbly is a great community. I have met many neat Curbly users, although, it was difficult to find them without knowing where to look first (cough, cough), and once I found them, I wasn’t able to send them a private message (cough, cough). Otherwise, I found that Curbly has become the answer to many of my living space dreams and aspirations, not to mention the frequent Curbly contests that can better your chances of living that dream (this one being the latest).

Watch out Martha Stewart! I am Tim Benzinger and I have a profile on Curbly!

Simply send a message to IMified to get started (AIM, Yahoo, MSN, Gtalk, and Jabber are all supported). An account will instantly be created for you preset with three IMified applications: Notes, Reminders, and Todos. These applications are not only helpful, but make for a great starting point as you learn how to navigate around IMified. Navigating to a service is as simple as sending the numbers associated with each menu item and sending the letter “m” brings you back to the start message. IMified also has a web-based interface where you can update your settings and add additional services (send “7″ and click the link to get there). There are currently nine services outside of IMified that you can add to your account: Google Calendar, Backpack, Basecamp, 30 Boxes, Remember the Milk, WordPress, Blogger, Movable Type and TypePad.

The beauty of IMified is that all of the applications that you use are combined into one small service accessible through an instant messenger on your computer or mobile phone. However, because of the limited functionality with instant messengers, features are minimal. With Google Calendar, you can add and remove events as well as view upcoming and past events, but you cannot assign meta data or reminders to the events like you can on the web-based solution. The WordPress service allows you to simply add a title and body for a post and publish the post to your blog. Also, the Basecamp integration allows you to add messages, manage todo lists, and add milestones to a project. It may not sound like much, but having the ability to do all of that instantly without opening a browser is very helpful.

IMified also has a very helpful feature that lets you create shortcuts for specific tasks in a service. For example, you can create a one word command that lets you add a task to your todo list, which is much simpler than going through multiple menus and then adding a task. You can also add some text after a shortcut to automatically use it with the task at hand. So I have a shortcut for adding notes where I can type: “note [text i want to add as a note]” and a shortcut for adding tasks with “todo [the task description]“. So far, adding information with shortcuts has worked out great, but I can’t say the same with shortcuts for viewing information. When I write “viewnotes” to view all of my saved notes, IMified returns nothing and seems to only work when used in the service itself. Shortcuts also don’t seem to work when a service requires multiple responses to multiple menus. For example, I can’t add an event description and the date for the event at the same time with a shortcut Google Calendar. These are only minor problems though and I’m more than satisfied with the shortcuts that add information quickly.

Granted that the services IMified connects you with can all be used regularly in a web browser, it’s nice having the ability to quickly send a message to perform a task. If I want to add an update for a projects status in Basecamp, I can simply use IMified rather than opening a browser, logging in to Basecamp, navigating to the project, and submitting the message. There’s still room for improvement though, of course. For one, it doesn’t seem to send error messages if you send something in the wrong format, like a date for an event. Also, I really enjoy Sabifoo and how it creates a public page and RSS feed for all of your notes, which is something I would love to see with IMified. Maybe a way to view your tasks from the Todo service and notes from the Notes service online. In all, I love the simplicity of IMified and how I can easily access services that I use everyday from my instant messenger.

(via GenBeta)

Using a web browser or mobile device, head to your Glue address (you.gluenow.com) and login. The first thing you will notice is the minimal interface containing a drop down menu at the top and content right below. It is formatted in this manner so whether you are viewing Glue in a web browser or on a mobile phone, it will work just the same (note: I have tested with Windows Mobile 5.0). Once successfully logged in, you will find yourself in the overview section displaying your most recent news items and images.

Let’s get straight to adding content. Glue provides you with two options. You can use the Glue website or simply send a email to one of your Glue email addresses found in the settings. The website requires you to enter a headline and body for your news item and allows you to optionally insert an image, set the date, and choose an author. The email solution offers the same functionality where the "From:" header sets the author (connects email address to author), "Subject:" sets the news headline, and the "Body:" is the news content. You can also include images in your news item when emailing by simply placing a GIF, JPG, or PNG image where you want. However, Inserting an image in a news item through the website requires you to first go to the Image Library, upload the image, and then select the image when publishing the news item (Update: Jordan from Glue has pointed out that you can upload photos while writing a post. There is an upload option in the drop down menu where you select an image). Glue also provides you with some basic formatting and allows you to use HTML.

Once you have published some content to your Glue, it’s time to share it with the world. As described earlier, Glue does not provide you with a website address where you can view your content, though it would be nice if it did. Instead, it provides you with publishing options that let you grab your content from your Glue and use it on any website or community profile. To get started, head to the Publish section and click "Show Feeds." You will then see six publishing options including: RSS, Flash, JavaScript, PHP, ASP, and XML.

The three simplest options are RSS, Flash, and JavaScript because they are just tiny snippets that you can paste right into your site. Selecting "RSS" lets you add a link to your site so viewers can subscribe to your content; "Flash" will give you code to embed news in a scrollable area on your site; and "JavaScript", being more flexible, will load news on your site in HTML and provide CSS for customization. If you are handy with PHP or ASP, Glue lets you download full code for parsing and displaying your Glue content however you wish. This is great if you want more control with the appearance of your content or if you want to integrate your Glue content into an existing application.

Above is an example site that I have created using the JavaScript publishing option. You will notice that it will first load the sites content and then load the Glue content. Also, you will see that I was able to format the content to my liking. Because the JavaScript option dynamically writes the content to the page, I can use CSS to style the outputted HTML. It took around 10-15 minutes to get the site up and looking how I wanted. Not bad at all. You can also see that the post, "Testing Glue on WordPress.com," contains the Flash publishing option where a scrollable flash-based container displays my content.You can also see Glue in use on The Four Colour Process website (JavaScript option) and MySpace profile (Flash option). There are also some examples over at the Squad Blog.

In all, Glue offers a nice solution for publishing and sharing content on the web, but it’s no super-glue. For one, publishing to a site using the JavaScript or Flash option does not provide permanent links to posts which is important to me because it allows others to refer to specific posts. Secondly, you cannot set the amount of posts visible per page. Commenting functionality would also be a nice addition. Maybe Squad can add this functionality and more for a paid plan called "Super Glue" ;-). With all that aside, Glue makes for a nice product and I can see it being big with bands and MySpace users.

Back to School with the Class of Web 2.0: Part 1
Back to School with the Class of Web 2.0: Part 2

Educational Blogging

Blogging has quickly become one of the most effective learning tools in education today. It introduces students with new methods of communicating, improving their writing, and helps motivate them to find their voice. Dare I say it even makes learning… fun? Educators generally blog about school news, philosophies, and class activities. On the other hand, students tend to write about current events, personal beliefs, and topics related to their education.

In blogging, there are no set standards, no boundaries, no restrictions confining you to conform your thoughts to any given set of rules and regulations. You don’t have to worry about getting points taken off for not using the default: 12 point font size, Times New Roman, with 1” margins. You can write freely, and at your own pace. Also, bloggers can gain an audience from their writing. Unlike a school paper, blog posts can recieve feedback from students, teachers, parents, and ultimately, anyone in the world. (gasp)

Things I’ve noticed with student blogs

I often found, and many teachers have noted this as well, that the students would publish to their school blogs even when not instructed to. Students really enjoy reaching out to the world and they are so motivated by it that they want to write even more. They would describe how their day was, what they learned in class, or even things they learned or read on the news that day. It’s amazing.

I also found that many students became so attached to their blogs that they made it a responsibility to keep consistent. When they found they have been lacking in posts or that they haven’t been instructed to post for class in in a while, they would often apologize and feel as though they deserted their readers. It’s pretty interesting, although expected, to see that kind of connection with students and their blogs.

Also, I see that many students refer to other posts by other students in their writing, but do not appear to take advantage of trackback or pingback functionality. I personally feel it is essential that all bloggers understand the use of trackback technology, especially in this scenario, as it makes for communication outside of normal commenting. Not only that, it feels very rewarding receiving a trackback. So, I want to explain briefly how it works and what it means. In simplistic terms, you make a pingback by linking to the post that you are referring to in your post. This will notify the writer of the blog, adding a pingback “comment” to their post automatically, in turn continuing conversation. This is a great way for students to communicate back and forth rather than only commenting. If they have something to say and feel it’s worth a post rather then a comment, pingback or trackback it.

Student Testimonials and Reflections

“Blogs are revolutionizing this country, and many people are completely oblivious to even what a blog is much less what it can. So thank you Mrs. Vicki for convincing me what a viable resource a blog can be. Thank you for not letting me be ignorant to something so revolutionary.” – kyli

“At the beginning of the year when we started blogs, I didn’t really feel like doing these, and I thought that they were just a waste of time, but I was WRONG! I have loved having these blogs and I learned a lot about writing, people, things happening with my friends, I met new people, I have learned ALOT about things going on in the world, and I learned that I can be free to write what I want, and I like how people would disagree with me, becasue it just encouraged me to write more.” – Xoxo-Hillaryy-xoxo

“I love my blog so much! I like writing in it, even if there isn’t anything to write about! Haha. When i get bored, my blog says ‘Ashley, come write in me.’ I’m just joking, but it gives me something to do. I am so happy that we are doing blogs this year!” – Ashley

“I love my blog so much I can write what I want when I want except when my mom or sister is on the computer. My favorite part about having a blog is that it can be due on a Sunday and you cannot forget it at home or at school. I also like how you can write on it even if it is not for homework. The thing I worry about with blogs is that its world wide and if I say something to offend them then they will get mad at me and I wont no why. Other wise I think blogs are a great idea.” – Joey Girl

“When I wasn’t in the weblog group I would still be writing one paragraph essay. Now I’m writing a page essay.” … “Weblogs are helping me a lot.” – Jhonathan

General Testimonials

“Never in 25 years of teaching have I seen a more powerful motivator for writing than blogs.” … “And that’s because of the audience. Writing is not just taped on the refrigerator and then put in the recycle bin. It’s out there for the world to see. Kids realize other people are reading what they write” – Mark Ahlness

“Even when they’re out sick, students work on their blogs.” – Carol Barsotti

“I’ve got 6th graders coming in during their lunch and after school to add articles to their blog and to respond to their classmates’ articles.” – Al Gonzalez

“The response has been tremendous. Students seem so much more willing to blog in their own space and time. They seem less inhibited and more enthusiastic.” – Beth Lynne Ritter-Guth

Where to Start

So, where do you start? As a first stop, I highly recommend reading SupportBlogging. It will explain what educational blogging is all about, what it means for students and educators, and how you can setup a blog. I also recommend Blogs for Learning which is a new site containing in-depth articles on educational blogging and fantastic screencast tutorials showing the ins and outs of various blogging platforms (including WordPress and Blogger). Be sure to look over the article, “Student Blogging – What You Should Know,” and the case study, “Rocking the Cyber Canoe: Blogging in English.”

For teachers and students, I suggest using edublogs.org for blogging as they provide you with a free, hosted WordPress blog, a Wiki powered by Wikispaces, and Yacapaca assessment tool from the Chalkface Project. Or if you prefer, you can install a copy of WordPress manually on your own server or register for a free and hosted WordPress account at WordPress.com.

Photo Sharing with Flickr

Flickr is a free photo sharing site which has made its way into education providing teachers and students with an easy way to upload and share photos on the web. Students can search for photos to help with research and projects and educators can upload photos for classes, school events, and so on. I can also see Flickr being used in photography classes allowing students to keep an organized collection of their work, share their photos with the world, and receive commentary from viewers and classmates. And who knows? Maybe all it takes is a comment or a couple views of a students work to inspire and motivate them in continuing with photography.

One feature to take advantage of is Flickr’s photo annotation, or note functionality. In short, it allows you to add boxes around specific parts of a photo which you can add notes to. For example, if something was hard to make out in the background of a photo, one could place a note around it to explain what it is. What’s more is that other users can annotate your own photos. Say you are a teacher and you uploaded an art piece that you want your students to critique. Have them browse to the art piece and add notes around parts they want to comment on. Some great examples of this are as followed:

Beth Harris of the Fashion Institute of Technology, State University of New York, has used Flickr with her art history course so students can label and discuss paintings online (example above). Similarly, Ewan McIntosh has uploaded the painting, “Ivory, Apes and Peacocks,” where users then labeled and discussed the art.

Alan Levine has also shown that you can use the notes tool to create what he calls, “hot-spot learning objects.” As an example, he created a volcano diagram with each type being a learning object on the photo. The example is a simple chart showing the explosiveness of an volcano. If you are to hover over one of the volcano’s, a Flickr note will appear containing more information about it. Alan has also annotated a photo showing some of the many uses of Flickr. Nice work!

Educational Podcasting

Podcasting is a powerful medium that many educators and students are beginning to pick up that not only delivers rich educational content, but enhances student/teacher communication. As I student, I could download educational content and take it around with me where ever I go. I could also download daily lessons and school news created by educators. Likewise, I can produce my own podcast and publish it for the teacher, classmates, and the world to hear.

Take Stanford University for example where they have created Stanford on iTunes U for their students. Students can navigate to this site to subscribe to the Stanford U podcast on iTunes and receive faculty lectures, interviews, music and sports automatically on their computer and iPod. This allows the university to easily communicate and update students on school related events and content. What’s also great is that anyone can open the page up on iTunes and listen, whether they are a student or not. Try it out and listen to some of the podcasts. There’s great content, especially in the “Technology Ventures” area of “Heard on Campus”, including speeches by Guy Kawasaki on entrepreneurship, Evan Williams of Odeo on podcasting, and more. (Note: Berkeley University also has Berkeley on iTunes U).

Apple also supports educational podcasting in multiple ways. For starters, anyone can access the Podcasts section in the iTunes Store and navigate to the educational category for free lessons and educational content. Secondly, schools interested in creating a podcast site similar to Staford University can apply for iTunes U where iTunes will work with you in making your own iTunes U (Note: I have no information regarding costs). Apple also provides a section called, Podcasting in Education, where you can learn more about podcasting, what it means for educators and students, and how you can create and manage them with Apple products.

For educators in K-12 education, I recommend looking over a great site called, “Podcasting in the Classroom”, created by Nathan Shelley. The website gives a brief introduction of podcasting and provides an overview of benefits to the students in creating podcasts. The site also provides educators with an example lesson plan where it instructs the students to get into groups to brainstorm, plan, and produce a student podcast on a specific subject.

DreamExtreme Podcast is an excellent podcast produced by, believe it or not, 6th graders! The student-produced podcast is by David Cosand’s Kennedy Elementary class of Medford, Oregon, and I must admit, it’s pretty impressive. Students plan and produce full podcasts covering class news, movie reviews, fashion, sports, and more. Another podcast that I’ve recently come across is Edupodder, produced by Steve Sloan. Edupodder has a nice mix of educational content, interviews, and student podcasts – the latest covering upcoming student podcast projects. Some of you may also be interested in an Edupodder Podcast with Robert Scoble speaking to a journalism class about the impact of blogging.

Wikipedia & Wikis

While researching about wikis in education, I came across a Wikipedia article for educators called, “Schools’ FAQ,” covering the ins and outs of Wikipedia and how schools can benefit using Wikipedia. The article led me to Wikipedia’s School and University Projects, which I found to be very interesting. In short, Wikipedia encourages teachers and professors to use Wikipedia in their classes providing students with hands on exercises involving editing and publishing content on Wikipedia. Wikipedia suggests that students participate in exercises such as working on existing or requested articles; linking orphaned articles to appropriate places; fixing spelling, factual, grammatical, and other errors in articles; and even translating articles from other languages. It’s a great idea and is beneficial to both the student and Wikipedia. Students can learn about the topic as well as improve on their writing while Wikipedia gains more content. Wikipedia even provides teachers with a syllabus boilerplate to hand out to their students. If you are a teacher, think about giving it a try with your class, maybe as a project. I feel it would be a very perceptible and comprehendible variation of learning. I will also add that these projects may be more suitable for college and university students rather than K-12 students.

Perhaps one of the most impressive cases of wiki use in education is the Westwood School Wiki. Vicki Davis and her students manage the wiki and use it for just about everything. Listening to an interview with Vicki and Adam Frey, I was able to grasp exactly how she and her students use wiki technology. One scenario presented was after teaching a lesson, her students would go to the class wiki and summarize the lesson, in turn making it easier to take in the information. Vicki also explained how her students work on notes collaboratively in the wiki before an exam to study. During this process they all add their notes, correcting what’s wrong, and review the wiki. Another example she gave was with introducing concepts and exploring class projects. She has the students research, add notes, organize information, and even add videos to their wikis so they end up with a mass of information about the topic (example project: Security and Privacy). Vicki stated during the interview, “Students really become content producers and not just receivers.” She makes a great point and it shows that allowing students to work hands on with a wiki really strengthens their learning experience. Being part and contributing to what you are learning is much more effective then simply taking it in.

I also came across this great question from a Vicki’s blog about Pluto no longer being a planet: “How long will it take for the Pluto decision to filter to the average classroom?” She then continues, “With information changing at an accelerated pace, I think the case for wiki-supplementation and wiki-publication can be made. This could ensure that more accurate information is included but could also make student’s heads spin as a chapter changes while they are studying it.” It’s a very interesting question and thinking back to my High School education, textbooks were dated as much as 6-10 years. Some even having my parents signatures in them! How long will it take for school systems to replace old books with new ones containing accurate information? It’s funny. I’ve come across multiple claims online where teachers tell students not to use Wikipedia because information may not be accurate when anyone can edit the information, but at the same time, the school may not even own up to date prints.

Video Sharing

To many school systems, video sharing sites are evil. They are blocked from students in an attempt to hide non-educational material and explicit content. Well I say, big mistake! I will admit, I have seen many hilarious, pointless, painful, and explicit videos on video sharing sites, but I can also say that I have learned a whole lot from them. Google Video offers some of the best educational videos you can find on the Internet. You can pull up their educational category and search for specific topics ; watch hour long NOVA videos (highly recommend – I’ve watched many of these during my free time); and even view captioned videos. Additionaly, YouTube offers a new service called YouTube College where students can join their college and share videos only with students from their college. On the down side, YouTube does not offer an educational category making it harder to find educational content. I also recommend giving VideoJug a try as a source of how-to videos. It has a great kids category containing fun science experiments and arts and crafts.

Video also appears to be the new PowerPoint for some educators. Jeff Utecht has taught his 7th grade students of Shanghai American School to produce and publish video presentations on YouTube for a class project. You can find the presentations in Jeff Utecht’s profile. I watched a couple of them and I’m very impressed. It sounds like the students were pretty excited, especially once they learned about YouTube’s audience. You can find more about the project and student reactions on Jeff’s blog.

James Madison University has also taken advantage of video sharing by using YouTube to deliver an orientation video for faculty teaching in technology classrooms. They created a video that shows educators how to operate the technology used in the classrooms including laptop connectors, projector screens, and the control system used to operate the projectors. You can watch the video and read the article about it on their technology website.

Web 2.0… Courses?

I never really thought about the possibility of there being a Web 2.0 course in college, but apparently it’s happening. IBM and The University of Arizona are teaming up to teach about Web 2.0 and Social Networking to give students skills in creating and managing online communities. What’s interesting is that it’s not just a presentation or learning event – it’s an actual full course! From what I understand, students from The University of Arizona will learn about Web 2.0 products and social networking from a business standpoint to give leadership, communication, and community-building skills.

One UA student in a Digg comment thread provided readers with the official course description from the university website:

“Online social networking and communities have become a big role in how organizations interact within themselves as well as with external partners. Developing a healthy community can lead to new business opportunities, improved customer relations, as well as improved communications to the world. Online social network sites already claim over 300 million members worldwide in public sites that are starting to turn into a new generation of b2b and b2c business collaboration and brokerage sites. This course investigates the technologies, methods and practices towards developing online communities, and how this knowledge and these skills are applied to businesses. The course will involve lectures facilitated by the instructor and corporate representatives. Also incorporated will be experiential exercises and skill development assignments”

The press release also states, “The class will culminate in a final project where each student from the class will work with their own separate group of students from Howenstine High School in Tucson, Arizona, to organize into many micro-communities.”

Sounds like a fun and informative class. And according to Torrentfreak, The Univeristy of Arizona will be the first to offer “Web 2.0 courses”. It will certainly open up a new world of technology to students. Great going, IBM! Sign me up!

School 2.0

School 2.0 is an interesting brainstorming tool designed for schools and communities to help envision the future of education. The tool is a diagram showing various possible scenarios or visions of the future with example student, teacher, and parent conversations, class room activities and technologies, and more. The School 2.0 site states, “While School 2.0 depicts a variety of educational and management scenarios that utilize technology, the examples, information and ideas included are designed to serve as prompts for discussion and should not be construed as a recommendation of any particular technology or scenario.”

“Can you IM that to the virtual whiteboard?”, says a teacher. A parent talks to his child, “I looked at your grades online today. You really aced that test!” “There’s a virtual frog dissection going on now,” one student said to another holding a mobile device.

It’s an amazing vision. Can “School 2.0” actually happen? Maybe not all of it, but perhaps some elements. For example: viewing student progress reports online, submitting permission slips online, and receiving class documents and files from anywhere. I can’t imagine “School 2.0” happening in the next couple years, but the possibility is there and it’s nice to see a brainstorm tool such as the School 2.0 project.

More Cases of Web 2.0 in Education:

Google Docs, formerly Writely, has quickly jumped into the educational field actings as a free and collaborative alternative to Microsoft Word. Mostly used by K-12 Education (from what my research shows me), I assume it’s just not ready for college or university scenarios where page structure has stricter guidelines. However, feedback from students show that although they like Writely (now Google Docs), they find more use in Microsoft Word because they know how to use it better. They then continue by saying that in time, they will likely prefer Writely because it can be accessed from anywhere with an Internet connection and can be worked on collaboratively.

Feed Readers and RSS are slowly making its way into education teaching students the methods of subscription and publication. I found that most schools that take advantage of educational blogging briefly teach about RSS so students and teachers can more easily keep track of school updates and postings. It also appears that Bloglines is the feed reader of choice (PDF by Will Richardson) for many educators, mainly due to it being accessible anywhere. However, some educators are beginning to notice other options that are simpler and more useful for students, such as the personalized homepage, Netvibes. “I used to teach bloglines, however this summer, I began to use NetVibes. It is just easier for beginners to understand,” said Vicki Davis of Cool Cat Teacher Blog.

It may sound odd, but some students are now learning in their SecondLife. Harvard Law School has recently started a new course called, CyberOne, where students actually log into their SecondLife account and learn in the massively popular virtual world. The CyberOne course website states, “Enrollment to the Harvard Extension School is open to the public. Extension students will experience portions of the class through a virtual world, known as Second Life. Videos, discussions, lectures, and office hours will all take place on Berkman Island. Students from anywhere in the world will be able to interact with one another, in real time.” Sounds a little extreme to me! I will admit though, I am curious as to how it all works. For those of you interested, head over to the CyberOne website and watch this video trailer (YouTube) that can give you an idea of what to expect.

Like this article? Digg it!

There are a few office applications I have left out in this series. First, many would argue email applications are part of an office suite, and I agree to that, but I have not included a category for them in this post because most colleges and schools provide email to students as is. If I were to recommend one, I’d say Gmail for its features and offered space. I have also left out database applications as I don’t feel they are essential to a student unless they are majoring in computer science or related, in which case they would likely use Microsoft Access or a school DBMS (Database Management System) – not to mention that the Web 2.0 database applications are more geared towards a completely different ball park. Additionally, I have decided to leave out imaging and project management applications.

This article has three sections to it: “Office Applications,” “Web-based Word Processors Compared,” and “Are Web-based Office Applications Ready for Education?” Also, be sure to check out the comparison grid, or feature matrix, in the “Web-based Word Processors Compared” section.

Back to School with the Class of Web 2.0: Part 1
Back to School with the Class of Web 2.0: Part 3

Red Arrows indicate personal favorites with education in mind.
Products may appear more than once if related to multiple categories.

Part 2: Office Applications

Word Processing

• Writely: Online Word Processor allowing users to create and edit documents collaboratively online, import Word documents, publicly or privately share documents, publish to a blog, and more.
• Zoho Writer: Similar to Writely, Zoho Writer is an Online Word Processor where you can create, share, and collaborate on documents. Users can also publish to a blog, import and export documents, and make documents public.
• Writeboard: Writeboard is a collaborative writing tool where users can write, share, revise, and compare their documents online with others. It is not an advanced system featuring a WYSIWYG editor, Ajax, and flashy effects, but that’s what I like about it. Writeboard is a personal favorite of mine and as a matter of fact I am using it right now for this very post. It includes version control with text comparing and is great for essays and writeups of any kind. More on Writeboard.
• ThinkFree Write: ThinkFree Write is a free word processor that, at this time, is probably the closest you can get to an online version of Microsoft Office with features and appearance in mind. You can perform formatting options, create tables, add a header/footer, and spell check as you type just like your average desktop word processor. Pretty impressive. You can also open and save Microsoft Word and OpenOffice documents as well as share documents online with others. Note: There are two versions of ThinkFree Write: Quick Edit (Ajax-based) and Power Edit (Java-based).
• AjaxWrite: Lightweight word processor that can read and write Microsoft Word and other standard document formats, display multiple documents at once in tabs, and feature basic formatting. However, feature wise, it just does not cut it for me. What I do like about it is that it’s very quick and there are no signups – get in and get out.

Presentations

• Zoho Show: Web-based presentation tool to create, edit, publish, and show presentations. Zoho Show is very feature packed allowing users to create presentations full of text, images, shapes, lists, and pre-formated content templates. Users can also import their existing PowerPoint and OpenOffice presentations, view presentations online, and export as HTML.
• Thumbstacks: With Thumbstacks, create and share web-based presentations over the web. Thumbstacks provides a clean and easy to use presentation builder, although not as feature rich as Zoho Show, and allows users to export presentations in HTML format.
• SlideShare: Great new service, currently available by invitation only, that consists of an YouTube-like site for Powerpoint and OpenOffice presentations displaying presentations through Flash players. Users can even place the Flash presentation players on their own websites. I’ve been waiting for a site similar to this for some time now; perfect for students and educators wanting to store presentations online for sharing and receiving feedback.
• Empressr: Empressr is an Ajax and Flash-based service that lets you create and share presentations online. One advantage on the feature side is that it uses Flash and Ajax rather than HTML and Ajax allowing you to add more media then other tools including audio and video, although I personally prefer HTML presentations.
• ThinkFree Show: Excellent Java-based presentation application that feels much like Microsoft Powerpoint. Create rich presentations and play them through the online editor or by graphic. You can also save your presentations for viewing in Microsoft Powerpoint and share them with others online.

Diagrams and Mind Mapping

• Mayomi: Mayomi is a free flash-based mind mapping tool that lets you map out ideas, projects, research topics, or anything else that can be dug into. Great for students when it comes to writing essays. More on Mayomi.
• Gliffy: Draw and share diagrams online using Gliffy. You get all of your basic functionality that you would in an offline diagram application but with a few extra bonuses like working online collaboratively and dynamic publishing of diagrams. Create flow charts, floor plans, technical diagrams, and more.
• mxGraph: mxGraph is a very impressive JavaScript based diagramming library where users can create advanced diagrams within their browser. The only catch is that it is not a hosted solution where users can create and save diagrams. It is a library in which companies, and probably schools, can use under the mxGraph license. I’d love for it to be a hosted solution, like Gliffy.

Spreadsheets

• Google Spreadsheets: Create, store and share spreadsheets on the web. Includes real time editing and chatting with others as well as import and export options. Google Spreadsheets is my web-based spreadsheet application of choice, although on the negative side, it does not provide chart functionality.
• EditGrid: “An online spreadsheet featuring real-time-update and extensive collaboration features.” EditGrid has support for more then 500 functions, includes remote data update, access control, and more.
• iRows: Create and share spreadsheets online, create charts, include dynamic information, and upload and save Excel, CSV and OpenDocument files. More on iRows.
• Zoho Sheet: “Zoho Sheet is a web based alternative to traditional spreadsheet applications, like MS Excel or Openoffice Calc. It provides basic spreadsheet functionalities coupled with web based features like sharing, tagging, publishing and more.”
• Num Sum: Possibly the first web-based spreadsheet service launched that introduced social spreadsheets where users can tag their spreadsheets and share with others.
• ThinkFree Calc: Java-based spreadsheet application that has the look and feel of Microsoft Excel. Users can share their spreadsheets and work on them collaboratively online.
• Numbler: Simple online spreadsheet solution with great real-time editing and chatting with multiple users. Nice and clean interface although not as feature packed as some of the other options.

Calendars

• 30 Boxes: 30 Boxes is an online calendar that I feel works great for students due to its simplicity and sharing options. It also features RSS subscription to automatically populate the calendar with feed items on the day they were published – great for tracking teacher blogs and academic feeds. Furthermore, users can access their calendars on the go with 30 Boxes Mobile.
• Google Calendar: A bit on the advanced side, but once you get used to it, you’ll find it’s quite powerful. Users can create multiple calendars; view by day, week, or month; share their calendars with the web or a select few; subscribe to other shared calendars; and more. More on Google Calendar.
• Spongecell: “A free and easy to use calendar for you and your friends.” Features a simple drag and drop interface where events can be created and viewed on calendars in multiple formats. Users can also share their calendars with others.
• CalendarHub: CalendarHub offers a great service for personal and group use offering a simple drag and drop interface, calendar subscribing, reminder notification, and more. More on CalendarHub.

Miscellaneous

• Scanr: Scanr is an interesting product great for those without access to a scanner. Scan, copy and fax whiteboards, documents, and business cards with just a camera phone or digital camera! Great for research at the library and creating a backup of printed class handouts on the computer.
• eFax: Although this may not be that useful for students, I felt it’s worth mentioning. eFax lets users receive faxes through email for free simply by providing them with a temporary phone number that senders can use to send their documents. eFax is free for receiving faxes but will cost you to send them out (eFax Plans).
• Gmail: Generally, most colleges and schools provide email, but if you’re an High School student, chances are you weren’t given one. I’d personally recommend Gmail for its features and space, however you may have trouble using it in schools due to its chat functionality.
• Google Page Creator: Users can create quality sites without learning HTML or any other technical knowledge, although they can use them if they wish. You get 100MB of space for yoursite.googlepages.com and can upload files and attach gadgets to your pages. Here’s an example site I created in just a minute with Part 1 of this series. Dead simple, but presentable.
• Zoho Creator: Can’t find a product that does what you want? Try creating your own. Zoho Creator allows its users to structure a database, insert and connect data, and publically share it with others.

Web-based Word Processors Compared

Throughout my educational career as a student, I know that the program I spent most of my time in was Microsoft Word. In college, every teacher requested that we type our assignments up and send them to their email address so they can “easily” download, review, and email back with changes. It’s a process, and it works, but with today’s technology and offerings, things can be much simpler. Imagine one location where students compose and publish papers accessible online and a place where teachers can collaborate with their students without the need to download or email a single document.

After compiling a list of online word processors for this series, I decided to seperately research each one to find if they are ready for educational use. I realize that services like Writely are excellent for users like me, using it to compose and collaborate on documents for Parallel (my company), but what about students when it comes to assignments that are required to follow certain formatting? Can these web-based word processors handle it?

Time to put web-based word processors to the test! First, I created an account over at Competitious to easily list common word processor features and view a comparison grid displaying features from each product. I then went through features of Writely, Zoho Writer, AjaxWrite, and ThinkFree Write (Online). After viewing the results, it was clear which were capable of following common writing and paper guidelines.

Page & Text Formatting

Student papers don’t require too much formatting, but there are guidelines and structures to be followed – for example, MLA Formatting on research papers. Will we be using web-based products to work on these kind of papers? I can’t say, but I would imagine that we would need to if there are hopes for entire web office suites in the future. During my High School and College career, I’ve had to change document margins, add headers and footers, double space sentences (or often 1.5 space), and enable page numbering. Are web-based word processors capable of such formatting? To find out, I have tested each one looking for text formatting options and page formatting options. Can users bold text, add paragraph styles (Heading 1, Paragraph, Blockquote), double space lines, make page breaks, and add page numbers to the header of each page?

Writely and Zoho Writer are similar in that they offer all of your basic text formatting options, including: bold, italic, paragraph styles (Normal, Heading, Paragraph), and line spacing, but lacked when it came to page formatting only allowing for page breaks. AjaxWrite fell behind when it came to paragraph styling, line spacing, and document formating. Lastly, ThinkFree passed with flying colors featuring text formatting options and page formatting options. It had margins, page breaks, page numbering, and even custom headers and footers. It’s practically Microsoft Word online in appearance and functionality.

Functionality

I want in a word processor, in terms of functionality, spell checking, copy & paste, undo & redo, find & replace, auto-save/backup, and at times, word count. These are functions that I use regularly when working on papers and I assume others as well. Fortunately, all the processors had these functions, except for Zoho Writer not having word count and AjaxLaunch without spell checking, backup options, or word count – didn’t even prompt me when “accidently” closing an unsaved document.

Collaborative Value and Sharing

One advantage is that these products are web based. You can access your documents anywhere at any time and work on them as you normally would. Being web-based also allows you to share documents with others and work on them collaboratively. Users can even work on documents together in real-time from different locations or even post to their blog.

Writely has five stars in this department making it very simple for anyone to publicly or privately share documents, tag documents, compare versions, add comments, subscribe to RSS, and best of all, collaborate in real-time. Zoho Writer had similar results, except I found it a little more confusing to use and had a rough time finding an RSS feed. AjaxWrite had no collaborative functionality or sharing options at all, though its purpose is to simply act as a word processor. Lastly, ThinkFree featured public sharing, tagging, version control, and commenting, but no real-time collaboration like Writely and Zoho.

Feature Matrix

Thanks to Competitious for their great service (expect a review soon), I was able to easily create and manage a Feature Matrix. Competitious does not offer exporting of the Feature Matrix at this time, but they have kindly allowed me to use it for this post.

The matrix covers formatting, document structure, functionality, document objects, collaboration, exporting, and importing. If you have any suggestions about this feature matrix, please feel free to pass it by me and I will change it. I tried to only include common features in word processors, so if you think something is missing that should be there, please let me know.

Summary

These applications are impressive, but not quite there yet. ThinkFree is the only one that was capable of producing an MLA formatted document with double spaced lines, 1-inch margins and headers with my last name and page number. The only problem I had with it though was the fact the interface was so similar to Microsoft Word (confusing and intimidating) and that is was Java-based. Writely on the other hand had an excellent interface that was very inviting with great collaborative features. Zoho Writer had similar results as Writely, but I found the interface to be a little confusing and I deeply missed the top menus you see in applications these days (File, Edit, View, Help, etc.) which made it harder to look for specific functionality. Finally, AjaxWrite did fair in my opinion, acting as a basic word processor but just didn’t cut it for me due to the lack of features.

Are Web-based Office Applications Ready for Education?

As you can tell by the compilation above, Web Office is nearing. But are these applications ready for any main-stream attention? Should we just drop the desktop counterparts and start using Web 2.0 (or Office 2.0) products? In my opinion, not yet, but we’re certainly getting closer to the possibility.

Who knows when it will happen? Maybe in a couple years, or maybe five. What I do know is that right now, web-based office products are on a roll with new enhancements week after week because of technology improving day after day. Not to mention, they’ve got some pretty convincing features to switch for already including collaborative editing, document sharing, online storage, and so on. Did I mention they’re free? At the same time, they lack some important functionality, such as: document formatting (margins, headers, footers, page numbering); adding sounds and video to presentations; and advanced spreadsheeting with charts and forms. Also keep in mind dependence on Internet connection and possible security issues.

All in all, I do not feel school systems or businesses should immediately jump on the Web 2.0 train, but I think it’s time they start considering it as an option and try some of the solutions it has to offer. Try some of the applications for a week or two and find if they work for you. If your a teacher, see if your class prefers writing in the friendly and social Writely, or the intimidating and feature packed Microsoft Word. Some teachers are already doing it (you will see real cases of this in Part 3 of the series). Why not you?

It’s clear people like these kind of sites and Popurls has seemed to start a chain or a class of these sites carrying on the concept. I’m not exactly sure what to call these sites as they are basically one page feed aggregators, but I suppose it’s safe to say they present the links, media, and search in a portal like fashion. So, I am going to call these sites “portals” throughout the post rather then saying, “Single Page Aggregator.” Please, if you know of a better name to call these sites, feel free to add your input.

There are two portals that I check up on numerous times a day: Popurls and Digg View. Popurls for the latest buzz and Digg View for an easy to read overview of activity at Digg. Just recently a new portal popped up called Original Signal and Steve Rubel had mentioned in a post on the new portal, “There seems to be a new emerging class of sites like these that aggregate feeds for you.” I started thinking about it and agree that there are quite a bit of these sites now, some covering buzz and others specific topics, and so I decided to take a look around and see what I can find.

After compiling a list of portals, I grouped them into categories and decided to share them with you. Hopefully there will be at least one that will be of interest to you. You can find in my list of portals: Tracking Buzz and News (Digg, Del.icio.us, etc.), Tracking Web 2.0, Specialty Topics (Gaming, Tech Deals, Apple, etc.), Design Related News and Showcase, Media Aggregators, Build Your Own, and lastly, Tag Search Engines.

My Two Top Picks

Popurls: Most of you are probably familiar with this one. Popurls has the goal of bringing you the latest buzz around the web aggregating popular social services and websites and display them all on one page. Viewers can view popular headlines from sites such as Digg, Del.icio.us, Reddit, Newsvine, and TailRank as well as keep up on media from Flickr, Youtube, Odeo, iFilm, and more. If your trying to find what’s new and buzzing on the web, Popurls is the place to be and most definitely takes place on my Firefox toolbar.

Digg View: I’m a big fan of Digg and try to keep up with the latest popular headlines as much as possible. I come across many helpful articles because of Digg relating to Web 2.0, web programming, database optimization, and other tech related topics, but I also use Digg to keep up with videos and gaming. However, rather then using Digg’s website to track popular headlines, I use Digg View. Digg View offers a one page overview of the seven Digg categories showing popular headlines during different time-frames of the day. The site makes it very easy to keep up with what’s popular on Digg and also marks stories that you haven’t seen in orange. I love it. I sit here all day refreshing the page over and over waiting for new orange headlines to appear so I can view the latest popular story on Digg.

Tracking Buzz (What’s Hot) and News

The following portals include the latest popular links and news from various social bookmarking sites, blogs, and news sources. You can expect to see these portals aggregating sites like Digg, Del.icio.us, and Reddit. Personally, I’ll be sticking with Popurls, but maybe you prefer different.

• TheWebList: “A digest of the latest links other web users are visiting right now!” It’s basically the same thing as Popurls, but without the media. It provides bookmarking and search options and summaries when hovering headlines.
• popfeeds: popfeeds is a very clean and simple overview of popular feeds. If it weren’t for Popurls, this would probably be the one I would use because it’s very fast loading and gets straight to the point.
• ViralBabble: Although it isn’t all that pretty, one feature that I like about ViralBabble is archiving. Navigating to the bottom of the page will be a link to an archive section where you can actually view snapshots of previous days. So if you were out of the house yesterday and wanted to see what was buzzing, you can easily do so with ViralBabble.
• PopFeedo: By the makers of Feedo Style and powered by Feedo Style, PopFeedo aggregates and displays six popular feeds including Digg, Del.icio.us, Wired Technology, Reddit, Slashdot, and Yahoo’s Top News.
• 01b (Source): I probably shouldn’t be mentioning this one as it will probably be shutting down any day now, but 01b is Thomas Marben’s first creation that aggregates sites similar to his now popular, Popurls. Except this one aggregates a whole lot more sources, some in German.

Specialty Topics

You may be thinking, “Alright, why are you writing a post about these portals? Don’t they all show the same thing?” No! There are actually portals built for specific topics, such as gaming and photography. If you have an interest in a certain topic, maybe one of these can help you stay on top of relating news. If not, head down to the “Build Your Own,” area of this post.

• WiiNintendo: Nintendo fans, this one is for you. Excited about the new Nintendo Wii? If so, bookmark WiiNintendo to keep up with the latest news from Nintendo, The Wiire, Joystiq, and 1UP as well as videos on Wii from YouTube.
• Mashfot: Mashfot is all about photography. With Mashfot, users can find the latest news and popular links relating to photography and view the latest photographs from various photo sharing websites. View photos from Flickr and 23, news from Digg and Blogs, and links from Del.icious and Blinklist.
• PopDeal: Here is one for all of you tech-savvy individuals that want to save a buck or two on tech hardware. PopDeals brings you the latest tech deals from around the web by aggregating numerous websites specifically meant for deals on products, including DealNews, TechBargains, DealCatcher, and more.
• Don’t Meet Your Heroes: “Compilation of CSS and Web Standards related resources and news feeds from sources around the net.” The site claims to aggregate CSS and Web Standard sites only, although you will see a mix of other sources relating to Web 2.0, programming, Ajax, and more. Nice and simple page.
• xmlhttprequest: If you are a web developer, you can probably guess what this portal is about. Yes, Ajax. Find links to websites and news relating to developing with Ajax, keep up with sites like Ajaxian and ThinkVitamin, and keep up with Google’s JavaScript Newsgroup.
• MacScour: By the makers of Don’t Meet Your Heroes, MacScour scours the web for Apple news and Mac software updates. Keep up with latest news, software updates, rumors, reviews, and more.
• BozPages: Alex Bosworth of SourceLabs has created a neat site that basically allows you to make your own Popurls like page, or as he calls them, “simple one-off pages of RSS feeds.” He also provides some that he has created that aggregates feeds relating to Gaming, Web 2.0, Movies, Ajax, Google, and more. Only problem is that the pages seem to run a bit slow at times.
• Update: Original Signal Gadgets: Just as I published this post, Original Signal has created another site built to aggregate gadget related sites. The site includes Gizmondo, Engadget, CNET’s Gadget Blog, CrunchGear, and more.

Tracking Web 2.0

You’ve probably guessed this category was coming. The following portals aggregate blogs covering Web 2.0. If you like keeping up with all the new startups and products but don’t like subscribing to so many feeds, you may want to keep track of one of these sites. My personal favorite is Original Signal.

• Original Signal: Launched this month, Original Signal aggregates 15 Web 2.0 blogs showing recent posts and summaries. What’s also neat is that if you have visited the site before, new posts will stand out in bold the next time you visit. Original Signal is also by the makers of Digg View.
• Web 2.0 Workgroup: The Web 2.0 Workgroup is a small network of sites covering Web 2.0, which thankfully Solution Watch is a part of, and has a main page that displays each site aggregating three latest posts.
• Web 2.0 Reference: Web 2.0 Reference aggregates feeds relating to Web 2.0 and organizes them neatly on one page where you can sort them by Source or Category.

Design Related News and Showcase

Even though I am a web programmer, I’m definitely a sucker for anything design. I’ve known about a couple of these portals, but I grabbed my brother, Tim Benzinger, who is a graphic designer (also designed this blog), and had him help me gather some more for you.

• Most Inspired: Need inspiration? Check out Most Inspired, a portal that aggregates design galleries and showcases designs by hovering over each headline. I can spend my whole day on this site looking through all of the excellent design work.
• Enure Feeds: Enure includes feeds from popular design sites including k10k, lounge72, australian INfront, News Today, and more. Enure does not necessarily aggregate its sources but includes them using iframes. Nevertheless, it’s a nice portal that has some high profile design sources.
• Design Feeds: Design Feeds is a new one to me and I love it. It has many sources displayed in iframes, some that are galleries with visuals, others that are news relating to design and web development. The owner did a nice job at aggregating each source in individual frames styled to the sources appearance. I’m sure any designer can appreciate this site.
• Linkgrab: Linkgrab is a simple site that allows you to pick three design related websites and retrieve links from each. You can change the feeds at anytime and keep checking back. It would be nice if it allowed you to display more then three on a page.

Media Aggregators

For those of you that are interested in keeping up with popular videos, these portals may be for you. They are one page sites that display popular videos, with thumbnails, from video sharing sites. Warning, it is easy to waste hours of your free time watching videos ;-).

• The Internet TV Charts: “The Internet TV charts tracks the most popular online video clips each week from four leading Internet TV sites. All the best video clips, on one page.” Simple site showing popular Google and YouTube videos as well as links to Digg (video topic) and Videosift.
• vdiddy: Neat site that allows you to view videos from 12 different video sources. You can select a site and then watch the videos directly in vdiddy.
• Magg: Created with recently launched Dapper, Magg aggregates the latest and greatest movies from various video sharing sites. You can also search through the aggregated sites for videos.

Build Your Own!

Haven’t found any portals that caught your interest? Then build your own! I have three methods for you. You can use services offering one page aggregators, use your favorite start page site (ie: Netvibes), or use a simple Tag Search site and bookmark it for later reference.

• One Page Aggregators: I know of two services that can help you make your own portal in a matter of minutes. The first is SpeedyFeed (Example: Popular) and it basically allows you to import your favorite feeds and have them all displayed on one page in a similar format to Popurls. The second option is BozPages, which I had mentioned earlier. Simply head over to the website and add your favorite feeds to get a one page aggregator.
• Start Pages: You can also make your own by using a start page. I personally like to use Netvibes, but any start page will do. 3spots has an extensive list of start pages worth checking out. Also, if you are a Netvibes user, don’t forget about the Netvibes Ecosystem. You can add tabs on various topics to your account in a single click.
• Tag Search: The last method I am aware of is by using tag search sites. Now, it can’t be just any tag search site (well, it can if you want), but one that allows you to bookmark and retrieve results from multiple sources, preferably blog searches and social services. My favorite one is Newzpile. You can also use TagJag and the recently released, TagFetch. Just make a search, bookmark the page, and check back later for more recent headlines.

That concludes my findings! Hope you have found a portal that interests you. If you know of any other similar sites, feel free to comment below. And again, my two top picks are: Popurls and Digg View. Popurls provides me with more then enough of the latest buzz around the web and Digg View compliments Digg so well making it easy to keep up with popular headlines. If I had to choose a third, I would have to go with Most Inspired because it provides tons of inspirational work to browse through.

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Before we get started, let me explain how Crazy Egg works. Crazy Egg can be setup on any website, whether it be a static or dynamic site (blogs included), and is to be used as a tool to test your websites click activity. When setting up a site, you set a length of time for your test session and Crazy Egg will then provide you with a code to insert in your sites body. The next time someone visits your site and clicks on a link, input to a form, advertisment, or flash document, Crazy Egg will record its position. You then can view the click reports during and after the testing session.

The first page you will see when logging in is the Dashboard (Note: numbers blurred in the above screenshot are from a master Crazy Egg test account and are not all in relation to my site). This is where you get an overview of all your pages that you are watching with Crazy Egg. It is also where you go to add a page to your account for testing. Each page listed provides you with details on when the page was last tested, how many tests you have ran, and its current status (actively running or not). Selecting a page from the list will make a new area slide down providing you with a screenshot of the site and basic statistics including number of visits and clicks during the testing duration. To get to the more detailed reports showing the overlay and heatmap, click on the “View Results” button of any page listed.

Viewing a pages report will bring you to a new section of Crazy Egg with a toolbar at the top and your site right below. At default, the overlay reporting method will be shown and if clicks have already been recorded, you will see colored markers around the site. These markers point out where the clicks have been made and will be colored based on the percentage of clicks (blue for low percentage, red for high percentage). Selecting a marker will border the clicked object and pop open a little percentage bar showing the amount of clicks made on that object. You can also open all markers at once by selecting the gear icon on the toolbar and clicking, “open all.”

The next reporting method is, List. Selecting the list button on the toolbar will have a box slide down that will show a table listing all objects that have been clicked. Sorted by the amount of clicks, each row will show the element clicked, what type of element it is (a, strong, span, etc.), the amount of clicks, and the percentage of clicks. Viewing results in the list format makes it very easy for you to quickly grab the names of the most clicked elements, or least clicked, and makes for a quick overview, which at times is easier to view then markers around the site.

The last method, and my favorite method, for viewing results is using the heatmap option. Heatmaps are commonly seen in usability tests and eye tracking tests where the site is overlayed with a grey layer showing high concentrated areas in bright colors ranging from blue to red. Crazy Egg decided to use the same technique to show what elements are most clicked. Blue colored areas have a low percentage of clicks, while red colored areas have a high percentage of clicks. Using the heatmap makes it very easy for you to see what elements around your site receives the most attention and what areas of your site may need some improvement.

Now, let’s say that based on the results from the reports, you made some changes to your website and you want to start another test. This is no problem and Crazy Egg makes this very easy for you. Head over to the Dashboard and select your page. You will see a link below the page name that says, “test a new version.” Clicking this will bring you to a form where you can enter the amount of time you want your new test to run and click save. You will then be directed back to the dashboard where you will see that your page has multiple tests. On the right, after selecting the page, you will see the most recent test on top with the older ones following below allowing you to easily view results for any test you have had under that page.

Crazy Egg offers four plans to choose from when signing up ranging from Free to $99/month. For some, the free plan is all that will be needed as it allows for tracking 5,000 visits/month with 2 pages, which I feel is plently for basic website testing. One downside with the free account is that statistics wont be shown in real-time (live reporting). On the other hand, it may get a little pricy but offering 25,000-250,000 monthly visitors and unlimited pages with live reporting.

All in all, Crazy Egg is a great product providing helpful data to any website owner. I’ve been anticipating its launch since I first learned about it on TechCrunch and Mashable back in March, and I must say, it was well worth the wait. I’m impressed with how simple Crazy Egg makes it for website owners to visualize visitor click activity. You can use Crazy Egg for testing new designs, structure changes, ad placement, page content, and more. Based on results, website owners can learn how visitors see their site and how they should improve it. I will definitely be using this for all future usability tests.

In an interview with Philip Wilkinson, owner of Crowdstorm, Philip mentions how the “power of crowds” brings many possibilities to the online shopping world and can make all the difference when searching for a product. He also mentions how many large scale sites still largely rely on price comparison to get one to purchase a product. He sees this as being unhelpful and would prefer learning what product is most talked about or “buzzy” and what his trusted friends have to say about the product. I completely agree. I didn’t buy my monitor because Best Buy had it in stock at a low price. Instead, I bought it because my friends told me that it worked great and that the picture was of great quality. This is what Crowdstorm and the “power of crowds” is all about – buzz.

With Crowdstorm, users can search on products and learn why they would want to purchase a product based on the buzz around the product. Likewise, users can recommend products that they own using a Digg-style voting system as well as express their opinions about a product using commenting. Crowdstorm also provides blogging support (currently only works with Blogger) where users can add their blog to their profile. The user could then find a product they want to write about, select “blog it,” write about the product, and have the blog posts linked to on the Crowdstorm product page under, “Blogged By.” Crowdstorm is also part social networking in that you can friend other Crowdstorm users and get updated on all of their activity throughout the site when viewing your profile. Lastly, Crowdstorm uses a wiki-like system for products where users can easily add products and edit products on the website while others may view a history log to view past versions.

Overall, Crowdstorm has a very well designed and enjoyable website with a great concept. However, I am going to have to agree with Mashable that it will be difficult to come out on top in an already crowded space of social shopping sites. Nevertheless, I am excited for the public launch of Crowdstorm.