Wiki, Blogs, Podcasts, and RSS: Technologies Shaping Communication

1
Wiki, Blogs, Podcasts, and RSSTechnologies
Shaping Communication

• Matt Thompson

2
Bottom-Up Model

• Media on demand craze
• TiVo, DVR
• Google Current, Channel 156 Brighthouse
• Item/Service ratings
• Amazon.com
• Content ratings
• Digg
• Epic 2014 (http//www.robinsloan.com/epic/)

3
Our Students

• Service ratings
• Ratemyprofessor.com
• 8-18 year olds
• Average 8 hours and 33 minutes of media content a
  day
• Spends 1 hour and 2 min a day on the Internet
  (besides homework), up from 27 minutes in 2000

Time Magazine, March 21, 2005
4
Wiki

• Online collaboration forum
• Student Example www.wikipedia.org
• Free wiki www.jotspot.com
• Example nsoc.jot.com
• Login admin
• Password comm

5
Wiki Usage

• Internal
• Group document generation
• Edit and post comments
• Cut down on email
• External
• User developed manuals
• Employee contributions

6
Blogs

• Short for weblog
• Blogs the new editorial section
• Corporate Blogs
• http//blog.plaxoed.com/
• http//fastlane.gmblogs.com/
• Political Blogs
• http//jerrybrown.typepad.com/jerry/

7
Blog Content

• July 2005 Maxim - Technorati's most popular blog
  content is
• Iraq 564,000
• The Pope 158,000
• People's Basements 86,122
• Michael Jackson 77,646

8
Blog Success- Corporate

• Gizmodo (electronics) 1.5 unique visitors/month
• DiscHubs visitors went from 20 to 10,000 in
  three days
• Dailycandy (fashion) 1 million subscribers
• Cheen Chandras, jewelry maker, got interview
  requests from O, Vibe and Ladies Home Journal

All accounts are from Business 2.0, June 2005
edition
9
Blog Success- Corporate

• Treehugger (environment) 30,000 unique
  visitors/month
• Voltaics website went from zero to 5,000 visits
  in 24 hours. CNN, Discovery Channel and Playboy
  ran stories about their solar-powered backpack
• Luxist (luxury items) 400,000 unique
  visitors/month
• Ikon Vodkas website hits went up 400

All accounts are from Business 2.0, June 2005
edition
10
Blogs- What I Stress

• Must realize you are reading a blog
• Must cross-reference information
• Allows links to other pertinent information
• 99 of the time they are not an ending point

11
Blog Usage

• Excellent start for opinion/controversy
• Use blogs for insight from industry professionals
• USA Today Article
• Allow comment posting between class members
• Subscribe

12
Blog Help

• www.technorati.com
• Watchlist
• www.blogger.com
• Google free blog
• Students are familiar with Live Journal
• www.livejournal.com

13
MP3 World (Bloomberg)

• Apples iPod 82 market share in August 2005
• Up from 64 in Aug. 2004
• Survey of 600 high school kids found it number 4
  on their wishlist, and the iPod was not an
  optionstudents wrote it in

14
Podcasts

• Phrase coined because of Apples market share
• Simple audio files
• - Notes file can accompany
• - Enhanced podcasts include video/graphics
• Anyone can be a radio personality

15
Podcast Impact

• Pull vs. Push content
• Bloggers now have a voice
• Apples iTunes 4.9 support
• Voice over IP (VoIP) boom
• Standard radio programs available
• Advertising/Marketing/PR impact
• Academe impact

16
Podcast Development

• FCTL
• You do nothing!
• Skype (www.skype.com)
• Free service for VoIP
• Audacity (http//audacity.sourceforge.net)
• Free editing and recording software
• iPod
• 40 lapel microphone or iTalk

17
Podcast Recommendations

• Student conducted interviews
• Guest speakers
• Research development
• Value added class content
• Lecture supplement
• Discussion prompts

18
Podcast Pretest Results (84 Questionnaires)

• 38 used written only, 16 used audio only, 45.2
  used a combination
• 62 said they wanted supplements in both written
  and audio form
• 47 said supplements were very helpful
• Very few put the supplement on an MP3 player

19
State of Email

• 130,000 complaints a day about spam (FTC)
• 50 of respondents get 50 spam messages per day
  (Intelliseek Inc.)
• 15 of legitimate messages are filtered as spam
  (Assurance Systems)

20
RSS Feeds

• Real Simple Syndication, Rich Site Summary
• - Shares content between sites
• Dialect of XML
• Conforms to a standard code (three versions)
• Similar to HTML

21
Examples
XML
RSS
Buttons or symbols
22
Example
- The Orlando Sentinel Web site
23
Example
RSS feeds from the Orlando Sentinel.
24
Example

• HTML code
• Aggregator

25
RSS Readers

• Sometimes referred to as aggregators
• Relatively small and free
• Accept RSS feed and show abstract/PSA
• Populated with default feeds
• Allow keyword attachments
• Attach priority color codes with the keyword

26
RSS Impact

• Real-time information
• - Research
• - Utilize default feeds
• - Input your own feeds
• - Track blogs (Technoratis watchlist)
• Get your message out quickly (www.feedburner.com)