Here's an interesting post from Ray Jimenez on the types of jobs he can see emerging as organizations begin to make greater use of Web 2.0 tools. At a minimum, these seem like functions that should be incorporated into someone's job description. Some of the standouts for me included: PLE Assistants - Personal Learning Environments (PLE) - Downes, Sims and Kareer talk about the need of the connected learners to... Read more →

As part of my Typepad account, I can see referring links to my blog as they happen. If it's a link I don't recognize, I'll often click through to see in what context a post is being referenced and to (hopefully) find someone new to add to my network. Periodically though I'll click on a link, only to find that to get to the referring site, I must enter a... Read more →

Three months ago we started the Building a Better Blog Ning network. After three weeks I was still enamored with the community. Things were going well, we had a lot of new members. All was right with our little corner of the digital world. Then we hit a wall, which I blogged about a few weeks ago. Site activity was way down and we began struggling with ways to continue... Read more →

Lee and Sachi LeFever have done it again with Blogs in Plain English. The only thing I think is missing is a discussion of blogs as a learning tool. There's still a sense of blogging as a broadcast medium with some commenting and conversation thrown in. No criticism of Lee and Sachi here. I think that this video represents the more mainstream thinking/definition of a blog and that it's a... Read more →

Yesterday I created my first screencast on the evolution of a blog post. I did it using the free version of Camtasia Studio that's currently being offered by TechSmith. That's right. You can get a full-featured 3.1.3 version of their software for free! If you want to snag a copy for yourself, you can download a free copy of Camtasia Studio 3.1.3 here and request the free software key here.... Read more →

As someone who's been blogging for awhile now, one of the things I've realized is that skills and thinking that are second nature to me are not so visible to new bloggers. What I've been trying to do lately is to think about ways I can be more transparent in my processes, talking through decisions I've made, how I go about accomplishing various tasks, etc. This is also helpful to... Read more →

Kate Quinn, who I met through our 31 Days to Building a Better Blog challenge, has stopped blogging. In addition to time constraints and work frustrations, she says she made her decision because she felt she had nothing "original" to say: As a wise person may have once said, “If you don’t have anything original to blog, why blog at all”. With over 120,000 new blogs being created per day,... Read more →

An interesting post over at Tactical Philanthropy from Perla Ni, founder of the Stanford Social Innovation Review. She says, Does blogging substitute real action? I get asked about this a lot because I blog. Why are all these people blogging? Why aren’t they out there in the real world doing something? Especially in the nonprofit world – where there’s so much need and most ED’s I know are busy enough... Read more →

Heading into another bad week, so bear with me my friends. I'm still trying to catch up from last week and the many unread feeds, as well as prepare for several 12-hour days in my immediate future. That said, it's time to spread some link love (taking a page from Maya Norton's book). Mostly on blogging with a tool or two thrown in: Sue Waters' Advice on Being a More... Read more →

Here's how the blogosphere works. A few months ago, I didn't even know Christine Martell. Then came the 31 Day Challenge, during which we supported and goaded each other to reach the finish line, still connecting only in the virtual world. Then came some phone calls and an invitation from Christine to join her at the SIETAR conference in Kansas City, MO to present a session on the Art and... Read more →