Articulate vs. Lectora
When it comes to software development tools, I’m fortunate to work in an environment that understands no two tools are the same and each provide advantages and disadvantages. The fun part of my job is having a plethora of tools in my ‘elearning development’ toolbox: Adobe Creative Suite, Captivate, Visio, Lectora, and now Articulate. There are many others, but these are the most popular and most widely used.
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My normal morning routine when turning on my computer at work is open work email program, open calendar, open gmail, and launch Twitter.com. On the morning of August 06, 2009, Twitter would only respond with a network error. I immediately thought our IT Data Security group banned it, so I turned on the morning talk radio and heard that Twitter is defending against a DDOS attack. It was well after lunch before I could log on.
During that time suffering from Twitter withdraw symptoms, I had not realized how embedded Twitter had become in my daily routine. I follow colleges and other professionals in my industry and they became sort of a ‘comfort zone’ for me knowing I had a network of folks I could reach out to if in a pinch. Not to mention simply following their daily activities and what they’re working on was…well, like regular co-workers.
This was truly a disaster! Just like any disaster plan, I put into place an “Emergency Action Plan” for the next time Twitter goes down. And it will go down – all popular sites get hacked eventually.
Emergency Action Plan – Twitter Unavailable
- Listen to Pandora.
- Use Facebook instead (provided it’s not hacked either).
- Catch up on your RSS feeds.
- Catch up on reading your favorite blogs.
- Actually get some work done.
- Socialize with someone – in person.
- Surf eBay.
- Do something kinesthetic – build a Twitter bird out of Legos.
- Do something that actually requires physical activity.
- Make a to-do list of all the chores you’ve let slide because of Twitter.
Twitter t-shirt caption contest
Sketching out some Twitter birds for a recent project, this little character appeared on my drawing table. I immediately came up with a caption and thought how cool this would look on a t-shirt. Just as I cleaned it up to get it ready to print, I thought it might be fun to see what others would come up with for a caption.
So here’s the deal…comment on this post with a fun and whimsical caption that would go well with this image. I’m the judge (it’s my contest) and will pick the one that best fits. The winner will get a t-shirt with this image and their caption! Simple.
Rules:
- Contest starts today and runs through midnight Sunday, August 9.
- Profanity will automatically disqualify the submission.
- Keep it short. One sentence preferred.
- I reserve the right to cancel this contest at any time.
- Image to printed on a basic white t-shirt (size determined by winner).
One last note: add your twitter name to your comment post so I can tweet your caption and give you proper credit.
Good luck!
Let it be done!
Needless to say I’ve failed in my commitment to blog weekly this year. I do have an excuse if it is nothing more than to hear myself write!
I own two houses. Not by choice as I am not interested in property management and Lord knows I’ve tried to sell it. With the economy and overflow of foreclosures on the market, my (old) neighborhood’s property values have plummeted. Fortunately I am blessed and not in any trouble financially to afford two mortgages, but I am not desperate and not willing to “give” it away either. Thus, it remains in my ‘portfolio.’
Not seeing any activity in selling, the next option is to rent. The mere sound of the word “rent” conjures up all sorts of negative scenarios. Not to mention my lack of interest in property management, the house is 40 miles away on the other side of Memphis. Just caring for the lawn would absorb half a day with round trip driving time. For peace of mine and time, I hired a property management company to not only manage the property after it rents, but to do all the necessary advertising and background checks. I am pleased that within two weeks of hiring them we now have a tenant – for at least one year!
The house (#2) has been vacant for 2 1/2 years. It was the house my son and I lived in and when I remarried in 2007, I built a new house (#1). Initially I put a lot of time and money into #2 getting it ready for sale. It wasn’t the price, size, location, or even wall colors that it didn’t sell. It was most folks didn’t have the down payment and banks stopped the “if you can breathe, you can have lots of money” loans.
Other than maintaining the landscape and minor maintenance, I haven’t put much time or effort into it until recently. I received the new escrow adjustment on house #2 a couple months ago and about blew a fuse! First, in the middle of ‘08, the county tax assessor increased the property value by $16k. Dumb! The entire county’s property values dropped by an average of 20%, yet they went on a tax increase spree by re-assessing all property values. That’s a whole ‘nother argument! Second, since the house had been vacant for more than six months, I could no longer carry a rider fire policy under house #1 and had to get its own policy as a vacant property. Finally, the new escrow payment was…well, lets just say enough is enough. I had my motivation!
All that being said, this summer’s freelance projects have been good. With one weekend day at house #1 and the other weekend day tending to house #2, weekday evenings have been freelance.
Blogging just hasn’t been on the to-do list. Although, during this time I have added many potential titles and tutorials I want to write about. This post is the first on the list and the “second” time I’m re-committing to weekly blogging. May even toss in a few extras!
Let it be said; let it be written; let it be done!
So, Me, You & SoMe
This post veers off of a bit with rambling thoughts on Social Media (SoMe) and its use in today’s marketplace from my pure observational perspective.
If you use any Web 2.0 tool or service that is user-generated then you know there is a lot of energy around SoMe lately. SoMe has been around for a few years now, but just recently has it taken hold in the marketplace as a viable collection of communication and marketing avenues.
In the big scheme of things there are still a couple things missing: how and when to use SoMe, and the policies that surround its usage.
One focus in my day job is how to implement SoMe as a training tool in the workplace – the how and when. In of itself is overwhelming, but it is interesting to see all the usages in News, Marketing, Entertainment, Human Resources, Risk Management, Personal Branding, and of course Personal and Professional connections. Policies on its usage shouldn’t be too hard as it follows the same phenomenon when email first entered the workplace. It’s the “how” and “when” that seems most challenging.
I participate (as often as I can) in a weekly chat session (TweetChat) on Thursday nights at 7:30 PM CST via the Twitter hashtag, #lrnchat. Last week’s discussion was how to use SoMe for customer or employee feedback. Needless to say with varying degrees of opinions during that chat, it was enlightening to share thoughts with others in the same industry faced with the same challenges. That in itself is powerful to be able to collaborate with colleagues on a topic that a year or so ago would not have happened unless we all converged at a conference somewhere. Even then it would have only been an hour long facilitated discussion.
Paul Greenberg has a great article just published on his blog, PGreenblog and on ZDNET titled, “Time to Put a Stake in the Ground on Social CRM.” His article is more about CRM (customer relations management) than employee usage and/or social media’s potential as a learning platform, however it certainly sparks the focus around policies.
What does this all mean and where is SoMe going? It is safe to conclude the likes of the more popular tools like Twitter, LinkedIN, and Facebook are no longer a fad. Sure, there will be new players, and the consumer (us) will decide which ones work best. What will be the next big SoMe attraction? Is Twitter the best? You have to admit it has set a standard of…well…simplicity.
Should I care if I only have 500 hundred followers on Twitter, 300 friends on Facebook, and 200 connections on LinkedIN? That seems like a lot writing it down just now! Should I want/need more? Seriously, if everyone had 10,000 followers and I had 10,000 followers, what is the likelihood my tweets ever get seen at all? Am I caught up in all the newness of it all sort of like the “honeymoon” period? Or am I participating in what is truly the foundation of the next generation of global communication? History will tell.
While I ride this wave, I’ve gotten myself into a pickle. First, I go to bed much later than I used to because I have this new found thirst for knowledge. I am amazed at what I discover late at night. Just about the time I’m ready to retire, I get a tweet from a friend in the UK saying “good morning” and offers a new question or link to an article, or an old high school friend’s daughter is graduating from H.S., or a couple of mutual friends just announced they’re getting married…whooda thunk!? I can’t go to bed now! Secondly, how does one manage all the different spaces and all this stuff?
There are several great clients and tools that have been developed to help me manage all my SoMe spaces like, Tweetvisor , iTweet for Twitter on the web and TweetDeck which is a desktop client and great for managing multiple identities. I have two: @learnnuggets for my profession and @delanotho my freelance cartooning biz. TweetDeck is a great tool because I can post a tweet and decide if I want one or both identities to post it. And I can post to Twitter and Facebook at the same time, plus it’s on my iPhone!
FriendFeed is a another tool to help manage multiple spaces at once, like Twitter, Facebook, and email. Aside from micro-blogging feeds, there is all the other blogs I read. I use several different RSS readers to manage those blogs, but I must admit I am not very good at it and always get way behind on reading them.
All said, there are hundreds more, but it all seems like a big whirlwind right now with no certain direction…then again, should there be? I mean, SoMe is user-generated and user-centric communities. If we (the community) don’t like what we see or use, we stop using it. Does that need a direction?
SoMe has tremendous opportunities in the future of how we communicate and collaborate with friends, co-workers, and customers even more so than today. Each of the SoMe tools have their place where one is good for news and marketing, the other is good for entertainment and socializing.
There is no argument SoMe is here to stay. What needs to be figured out next are the strategies behind the different uses. Should there be a global strategy proposed by self-proclaimed SoMe experts, or is each strategy developed for its particular use?
Thrilling ride nonetheless!
