My Online Presence - Part II

This is a continuation of My Online Presence - Part I. The main difference is that part I covered tools that I was already quite familiar with. Part II is going to highlight some new tools or categories that were introduced to me through my Digital Media class and my recent experiences with them.

Photo Sharing
Shutterfly - I've been sharing photos for a while and I started with Shutterfly because it didn't require viewers to login to access my albums (like some others out there!) but it's also very different from today's photo sharing sites.
Picasa - I've switched over to Picasa beacuse it's so easy to upload files, create public albums, and uses your Google email address as the login.
On Photo Sharing - You may have noticed that you can't find my albums on Shutterfly. That's because they are not public. You have to be sent a link to view them. It's kind of like the "unlisted" feature on Picasa. That's another thing I love about Picasa - you can choose to make albums public, unlisted or login required. Now, Flickr and Fotolog may be great, but just how many photo sites do I need? If someone wants to convince me why these are better, I'm all ears.

Video Sharing
YouTube - My main location for video uploads, although I sometimes just use Picasa for "home movies".
TeacherTube - I just signed up for this so no videos yet. I also couldn't figure out how to link to my space, so add me as a friend: robinmichele.
On Video Sharing - At first, I really wasn't sure why anyone would want to view my videos unless they were at the same event (a wedding clip, for example) but then I discovered many other uses: posting videos for classes, promoting my company, getting followers who are interested in the same topics as I am, etc... I look forward to seeing how TeacherTube can help expand my edtech network, especially using the TeacherTube toolbar. A tool that I like to use to help make some fancier videos or video segments is Animoto. I thought Odeo was another video sharing site but it seems like you can't upload, only browse & subscribe.

Text and Video Streaming
Qik - I created an account but you won't see anything there because my phone is not supported.
FlixWagon - I created an account but you won't see anything there because my phone is not supported.
CoverItLive - I found this on a blog I'm following and thought it looked cool, so I created an account although nothing is streaming live on it at the moment.
On Video Streaming - The first two are for video streaming via cell phone and while I think the concept is great for streaming live events, I can't see that I would ever just stream my life or whatever random thing I happened to be doing at any given point in the day. Again, for event, happenings, etc... it could make sense. I really wanted to use this at CommunityOne last week. Unfortunately, my phone was not supported by either of these two sites and I couldn't find one that does support PalmOS. I'm not holding my breathe either since PalmOS is being discontinued. :-( The last one is for text streaming of live events and while I can't think of an application for its use right now, I think it will come in handy in the future.

Video and Voice Blogging
Seesmic - I just created an account on Seesmic, so you won't find any posts yet.
Snapvine - I just created this voice blog widget but haven't posted anything yet.
VoiceThread - I've had an account for some months but really haven't done anything with it.
Utterli - Just created this account. I'm putting it here because it seems to be like a voice mini-blog. It probably could go under the mini-blog section in Part I also.
On Video & Voice Blogging - I have to admit, that I'm not sure what to do this. I guess I'll learn more about video blogging at the workshop I'm attending but for now I don't see the value. Why not just use YouTube or embed a video in your regular blog? It also sort of reminded me of other tools like VoiceThread and SnapVine, hence my links to them included in this category.

RSS Tools
Feedburner - I have an account and use feedburner to provide an RSS feed for this blog but really don't take advantage (or know the advantage) of many of its features.
Google Reader - My main reader for RSS feeds. For now.
On RSS Tools - To be honest, I haven't found one that I love. I use Google Reader primarily to capture all the feeds I want to follow but it requires too much effort to check often. I also use the Windows Vista gadget which is at least "in my face" when I log in. I also downloaded SplashNews for my Centro but haven't successfully imported custom feeds. I tried the evaluation version of QuickNews which was ok - I might have to buy it. Definitely open to suggestions on good feed readers! For some useful feeds on educational technology, check my blog roll and also go to EdTechTalk and subscribe to the shows that interest you.

Wiki's & Online Collaboration
Wikispaces - I'm a member of several wikispaces (collectiveintelligence, educon20, eduplan, and globalschool) and a creator of another (bogs4c). You can also see the working details of bogs4c.
Wikibooks - I contributed a chapter to a book on Wikibooks for a class on managing educational technology resources.
Google Docs - I've included this here because I've used Google docs to host group collaboration on a number of projects.
On Wiki's & Collaboration - I'm a big fan of these sites. We use Wiki's all over the place at work and it's an easy way to work together on projects. I enjoy collaborating with others to work towards common goals.

Bookmarking
Del.icio.us - A list of my favorite bookmarks. Very easy to search and browse.
Diigo - Similar to Del.icio.us. Same bookmark list, but I have found that posted bookmarks are easier with Diigo and it will copy them automatically to del.icio.us.
Digg - Bookmarking of articles, videos, pics. I have an account but don't really use it.
Bibme - I listed this here because I use it as a personal bookmarking site for all my research.
Pocket Knowledge - My e-Portfolio for school.
On Bookmarking - When I first started using these, I'd think I'd like them too much being quite comfortable with my Firefox bookmarks, thank you very much. But, the biggest advantage for me is being able to bookmark and view regardless of where I am. I don't really use the friend features of these sites too much.

Miscellaneous
Second Life - For fun, I'm Risa Wade. For work, I'm RobinGoldfarb SunMicrosystems. Yes, we use Second Life at work for meetings, training, press conferences, etc... It's kind of fun but I think the potential for uses in education are even more interesting. Check out the open source equivalent of Second Life: Wonderland. Stay tuned for more on this at Pocket Knowledge.
Ping.fm - I signed up for this because it sounded interesting. Send multiple updates at one time. Makes sense. However, I have 2 problems with it. 1) From what you know of me by now, I like to keep work, school and personal stuff separate. So, what I'd like to see from ping.fm is a way to group accounts and send an update to that particular group. Of course that will only work if they fix this second one. 2) I want to be able to send an update to multiple accounts of the same type (all my Twitter accounts, all my Facebook accounts, etc...) but ping.fm only lets you enter one of each type. If anyone knows of an update consolidator that lets you do these things, please let me know!
Lenovo Social - A good overview to Social Networking but doesn't let you join the community or anything. In fact, for a site about social networking, it's pretty anti-social.
Squidoo - So, I created a Lens called AllEdTech but I'm not sure what to do with it. I wasn't even sure what category this should fall under. It's sort of like a blog site, or maybe a bookmarking site, but focused on one particular topic. I'm going to have to play with this a bit more to figure it out.
On All The Rest - I'm sure there are a ton more things out there that I've missed but we'll just have to discover them together.