4. Things in a Flash: The Latest Web 2.0 Tools, Amy Springer, St. John's University/College of St. Benedict; Jenny Sippel, Minneapolis Community and Technical College; Martha Hardy, Metropolitan State University; Diana Symons, St. John's University/College of St. Benedict; LeAnn Suchy, Metronet
This session gave an overview of six Web 2.0 technologies that may be used in libraries.
- Prezi was presented by Amy Springer. While I was glad this technology was included, and some great points did come up when attendees were asking questions, the presentation of Prezi was somewhat lacking. Prezi, like any presentation software, is just a tool. The important message you are trying to convey is that of your lesson content. Some are hesitant to use Prezi because of the "sea sick" factor. When presenters get lost in the excitement of flipping, turning, outlining, and the seemingly infinite zoom, the audience looses the message and is concentrating instead on keeping their lunch down. I think Becky Canovan describes it well--Prezi should tell a story. As I mentioned earlier, there were some good questions that came out of the attendees. Prezi can be embedded into another webpage, downloaded as a flash file (should you need to present somewhere where internet is not accessible, and the flash file is only editable if you purchase Prezi Pro or Edu Pro licenses), and the recent upgrades make embedding a YouTube video a snap!
- QR Codes, presented by Jenny Sippel, was a great introduction for those unfamiliar with QR codes. QR codes originated in Japan and are the trademarked name for a 2D barcode. The codes are scanned with a device (usually a smart phone with a camera and scanner app). This can be very useful for connecting users with polls (i.e. Google Forms), facilitating library tours, linking to electronic versions of handouts or slides (making information accessible in a variety of formats), instant ask a librarian link, and when you use bit.ly to create the QR code (by adding ".qr" after the created short link) allows for analytics when you add "+" to the end of the shortened link.
- Dropbox, presented by Martha Hardy, is a user-friendly cloud storage account that comes with a desktop client. It not only provides cloud storage, but also performs auto back-up and version control for your files. Any file type can be stored, including photos and music, and you can easily share work (it syncs documents through multiple computers for those files in your shared folder). I have been using Dropbox since the conference and LOVE it--especially since now I no longer have to carry around a flash drive (and/or lose said flash drive). Currently storage for the free account is limited to 2 GB, with expansion possible when you invite new users or when you purchase additional storage (up to 100 GB). Dropbox works with Windows, Mac, Linux, iPad, iPhone, Android, and Blackberry.
- Diana Symons spoke about Diigo, a bookmarking/annotating tool with social networking possibilities. It allows you to highlight, add sticky note comments, choose whether your content is public or private, download the Diigo toolbar, and tag websites. You can take screenshots of just the content you would like to share. The annotations stay every time you return to the same page. You can upload a snapshot (to make sure you have the information, even if the site disappears in the future) and it is saved as html and as an image. A great tool for those who do a lot of online reading or for those just wanting to keep track of information they find online.
- Posterous is one of the easiest blogging tools around today, and was presented by LeAnn Suchy. You set up your account (it can be either a group or individual blog), add the email accounts that can update the blog, and ready, set, blog! Just send an email to post@posterous.com, or you can use the web interface. If posting via email, the subject line is the post title and the body is the text. If you send an attachment, the file becomes embedded within the blog; you can even attach mp3 files. You can set up your account so you have to click to approve a blog post (particularly helpful when having a class post to a group blog, as it gives you a chance to proof the post to make sure it is appropriate).
- Last, but not least, is Topicmarks, also presented by LeAnn Suchy. Topicmarks allows you to log in using an existing account (i.e. Yahoo or Google) or you may create an account specific to Topicmarks. New since the end of 2010, this program summarizes documents you upload (i.e. Word documents, PDFs), text you paste into the box for analysis, or web links (and there is a bookmarklet you can use to have Topicmarks analyze the website with one click instead of copying and pasting the link url). Your uploads are automatically visible to "friends" you have added on Topicmarks, but keep in mind when you upload a copyrighted document you have to remember to change the security settings to "private." While this tool is still very much in the beta stage, it can be a helpful tool for analyzing your own writing, and for identifying key words and basic facts (though, keep in mind, just as is the case with citation tools, the final result may be far from perfect so users have to keep in mind this is a tool to help them understand the item they uploaded, not an authority or necessarily accurate interpretation of the work).
More information may be found here: http://libtech2011.pbworks.com/w/page/37057543/FrontPage
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