Final- Google "Living Stories"

Google Living Stories takes a different approach than other news sources because unlike other internet news providers, all information on a certain topic is unified into a section that save you from constantly searching for new updates on a developing story. Living Stories provides a "one-stop shop" for individuals who always want to know the latest information in current events. It is very organized with time stamps of when posts were developed, time-lines of the topics, filtering for more or less detail, text, images, and/or audio, etc.

I think that Google Living Stories will help to reduce bias in the news because seeing different aspects of an issue all in one place can give more reason to views. It can also help people to organize their thoughts on an issue better by seeing progress as it develops. It gives people to see views from different sources from a neutral standpoint and have a more neutral standpoint also.

I would like to see a general search bar added so that people can choose exactly what news they want to see information about. There are not a lot of different options as far as the topics you can follow. Maybe having a categories list could help even. It could list types of new such as: Entertainment, Politics, World, Sports, etc.

Otherwise, I think it was a smart addition to he many things Google has created to make the surfing the web simpler and easier to manage.

Christmas Break is Coming Up Soon!

The holiday is so close to being here, I can smell the Egg Nog. Finals are approaching just as the snow is beginning to fall. It is becoming harder to pull yourself out of bed, but the "BIG BREAK" is just around the corner so that should be plenty of motivation for the "late bird."

Happy Holidays Everyone!

Social Bookmarking

What is Social Bookmarking?

• A technique for Internet users to manage bookmarks of web resources through a website rather than one computer.

Who is using social bookmarking services?

• Teachers and students, and anyone else who knows about it.

How does it work?

• You load the social bookmarking webpage of your choice, sign up to create a profile, add the webpage's link to your toolbar, and start creating bookmarks to web resources.

Why is it significant?

• It helps organize bookmarks easily, and creates a way to share them with others without copying or pasting links. You can tag your bookmarks and make them stand out among other based on how common it is used.

Where is it going?

• More and more people are learning about social bookmarking and has become more useful than a computer's browser toolbar favorites section.

How can it be used by teachers and students?

• Teachers and students can share informative links to provide more resources for an assignment or for it be another means of citing information used for research.

What are the downsides?

• The tagging can be misleading because it is done by humans and not the computer system. They can be misspelled or categorized incorrectly. Also, the tags can lead to spam if spammers link to their websites over and over with popular tags.

What are the benefits (compared with traditional bookmarking methods)?

• The fact that you can tag your bookmarks so they are easier to find in the future is very helpful. Also, to be able to share your bookmarks without going out of your way to do it is a plus.

List 3 popular Social Bookmarking sites that you have explored and tell us which one is your top pick.

• Tagza.com, Delicious.com, Faves.com
• My favorite is faves.com because it doesn't open the add link thing in the same window your current webpage is in, it simply opens a flash player box over the window and automatically includes the url. Also, there was a facebook application to the website and it was much easier than the other to navigate through.

ScreenCast To Do List

For my screen cast presentation I plan to get the attention of present and near-future freshman college students. I want to show a guide to becoming a successful college student. People often have issues with feeling overwhelmed when entering college. Everyone's high school is not the same. When entering college, some students are faced with a huge transition from the papers they wrote in high school and the one's they will begin to write in college. I simply want to make the transition a bit simpler and provide a process easy to recognize and follow. I want to make the learning experience exciting and not very time-consuming. This is the point of making my screen cast include sound, graphics, and effects.

My To Do List

1. I will be recording my screen cast on my laptop, in the privacy and comfort of my dorm.
2. I will use the Jing Project software program to record and Camtasia program to edit. I had to install Jing. Although my computer comes with a similar feature to Camtasia, I will need to install it also.
3. I will be recording my voice to introduce and sum up the points of my presentation. I will be using my roommate's headset attachment that came with her cell phone.
4. I may need to test the headset because it was made for a cellular device and not for computer software.
5. I plan to record the entire screen cast before editing any features or adding sound so that I will have a base format to go back to if I make changes that I do not want to make permanent in editing.

ScreenCasts

I found some articles on screencasting that gave me a better understanding of what they were and how they are used. Here are the links to those articles:

1. http://idealware.org/articles/screencasting.php gives an intro to screencasting.
2. http://www.articlesbase.com/human-resources-articles/screencasts-effective-technology-training-in-enterprises-765372.html shows how it would be effective in the work environment, and gives a small tutorial or example throughout the article.
3. http://www.articlesbase.com/marketing-articles/screencasts-as-a-marketing-tool-256005.html talks about how screencasts can be used as a marketing tool. Marketing is my major so this was very useful.

I recently was researching a few screencast programs and comparing them.

One that I found was AviScreen. It is a basic screencast with not much detail or direction. I would say it is for more advanced users because you would have to already know what to do when you open the program. Before my research assignment was given to me, I knew nothing about screencasts so this program was very difficult for me to understand and get the hang of.

• Link to website:http://www.bobyte.com/ once on website, scroll down until you see AVISCREEN(Screencast program) and click to view the webpage.

Another screencast software program that I found was CamStudio. It was easier to work with than AviScreen because it had the main buttons of the screencast visible on the main toolbar. After the first try using it. I understood it's purpose without direction. CamStudio was simple to use and I think that it would be easy for me to show someone how to use it, by actually using the program.

• Link to website: http://camstudio.org/

The last screencast software program I researched was Jing. In my opinion, it was the best that I had saw. Jing is a free software like the other two, but it is not a trial and the features that you get to use for free are pretty amazing. After you download the program, Jing offers to show you a tutorial video of how to use the program. This was the first program I've known to do that. It lets you customize the uses alot which makes it easy to understand. Jing also allows you to log in to their program so that your saved work may be viewed on screencast.com without hassle. I would recommend that anyone who is looking for a free screencast program use Jing.

• Link to website: http://www.jingproject.com/