Blogs, Wikis, ListServes and other Cool Web Stuff

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Blogs, Wikis, List-Serves and other Cool Web
Stuff

• Russ Scaduto, Ph.D.
• Director of Education Technology
• Nov. 17, 2006

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Blogs, Wikis, List-Serves

• All are tools for group communication and
  collaboration
  
• Each has their own strengths and weaknesses for
  achieving specific group communication goals
  
• Blogs and Wikis are available through free web
  services. PSU supports List-Serves (theyre
  working on the others)
  
• Well discuss each type.

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Blogs

• A blog (Web Log) is a website where entries are
  made in journal style and displayed in a reverse
  chronological order. It is usually maintained by
  one person and others can post.
• Very simple to use. Most provide templates that
  can be customized, if desired.
  
• There are 60 million on the web today. This
  trend has created a venue for personal
  journalism, complete with indexing and search
  capabilities.
• Most are public view and private post, but other
  combinations are available (for free!).
  
• Info from PSU http//tlt.its.psu.edu/suggestions/
  blogwiki/blog.html

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Blogs, some examples

• http//scadutofamily.blogspot.com
• http//blogger.com (from Google)
• EdBlogger Praxis (http//educational.blogs.com)
• http//www.bloggingpro.com
• http//wordpress.com A private blog!
• http//http//www.vox.com Another private blog
  service
  
• Forbes best blogs (http//www.forbes.com/bow/b2c/s
  ection.jhtml?id12)

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How are blogs used?

• Eight percent of internet users, or about 12
  million American adults, keep a blog. Thirty-nine
  percent of internet users, or about 57 million
  American adults, read blogs.
• 37 cite my life and experiences as a primary
  topic of their blog.11 cite Politics/government
  as the main subject of their blog.7 cite
  entertainment-related topics as most popular
  blog-type6 use blogs to follow sports5
  general news and current events5 business4
  technology2 religion, spirituality or faith1
  hobby1 health problem or illness
• Note, these numbers dont add to 100

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Wikis

• Wiki is Hawaiian for quick or fast
• From the wikipedia, the mother of all wikisA
  wiki (IPA w?.ki or wi.ki
  1) is a type of Web site that allows
  the visitors themselves to easily add, remove,
  and otherwise edit and change some available
  content, sometimes without the need for
  registration. This ease of interaction and
  operation makes a wiki an effective tool for
  collaborative authoring. The term wiki also can
  refer to the collaborative software itself (wiki
  engine) that facilitates the operation of such a
  Web site, or to certain specific wiki sites,
  including the computer science site (an original
  wiki), WikiWikiWeb, and on-line encyclopedias
  such as Wikipedia.
• The Wikipedia is a free on-line encyclopedia
  based on a Wiki
  

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Some Wikis

• A few free Wikis
• PBWiki (http//pbwiki.com)
• Wikispaces (http//www.wikispaces.com)
• Wikidot.com (http//www.wikidot.com)
• Hosted Services
• Site Ground (http//www.siteground.com/wiki-hostin
  g.htm)
  
• Atlassian (http//www.atlassian.com/software/confl
  uence)
  

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Some interesting Wikis

• Wikia (http//www.wikia.com/wiki/Wikia)
• WikiHow (http//www.wikihow.com)
• WikiMatrix (http//www.wikimatrix.org)

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List-serves

• A list-serve or an electronic mailing list, a
  type of Internet forum, is a special usage of
  e-mail that allows for widespread distribution of
  information to many Internet users.
• Not as popular a communication tool as it once
  was.
  
• Messages are in your email. This can be good or
  bad, based on your preferences.
  
• A moderator establishes the list (of email
  addresses). When a member sends an email to the
  list, the list-serve sends it to all members.
  
• PSU provides list-serve functions.
• Other technologies are becoming more popular,
  see http//groups.google.com.