TWO ways to add audio to your blogger blog

OK, we learned in class that you can't add an audio file directly into your blog. That's true, the over all process to getting audio into your blogger blog is:

• Create audio file in mp3 format
• Upload to some serverspace (we used Googlepages)
• Create a link in your Blogger blog to take you to your server space.

When you add audio using Googlepages, it looks like this:

Click here to go to my audio file stored on Googlepages.

(Good news--100GB of storage. Bad news--it's kind of cumbersome for the user; a solution, but not an elegant solution.)

---

But I did just find another way to do this that is MUCH more elegant for the user, but a bit more complicated for you as the blogger (it involves adding some HTML code. Here's what it looks like: This audio file is linked using FileDen.com

(Good news--it's 1GB free storage and can be direct linked which looks MUCH more elegant. Bad news--you have to continue to PASS on the large number of "special offers" they throw at you before you get to the upload screen.)

The instructions to do this are on the Templates Tips and Tricks blog. It's a bit complicated, but the result is defintely more elegant looking and I'll probably do this from now on even if all the "special offers" drive me crazy.

GREAT Resource for Learning Computer Applications

As Drake students, you have access to a wonderful resource: a library of online tutorials to help you learn a variety of software programs. Check out this post on my advisee blog to learn more.

Charity, Volunteering & Fund-Raising Websites

While not specifically collaborative technologies, this Mashable blog post lists 20 to help you give of your time & money and tools to help you with your fundraising.

Obviously the purpose of these websites are to try to connect the people who want to give with the people who need donations and volunteers. My challenge: how can you take this similar concept of connect those who have (time, skill, knowledge, etc.) with those who need it in your environment?

Collaborative Technologies + Corporate Learning

October's Chief Learning Officer (CLO) magazine has an article on when Social Networking Meets Corporate Learning. At this point it's not new news to any of you, but you may want to share it with someone who hasn't been in this class! :-)

---

The November issue of CLO also has an interesting article on where the 2007 organizational learning budget is being spent and on what (according to a survey of the CLO magazine Business Intelligence Board members.) There are some interesting results according to this survey including:

• The learning budget growth is slowing in 2007 (continuing a slow down that started in 2006)
• The top learning investment areas are e-learning, and then a 3-way tie between leadership/executive development, performance management, and design/development of in-house training.
• The top learning technology investment is Learning Management System (LMS) at about 50% response rate compared to the next closest response at a little over 30%.
  
  

The November issue of CLO is not yet posted on the website, but you can access the Chief Learning Officer magazine throught the Drake online databases if you want to read this article.

Measures of the Ubiquity of Blogging?

Certainly some of the tests to check for the ubiquity of blogging might be to see if there exist:

• conferences (Blog World Expo),
• subspeciality conferences (God Blog Conference-"Helping Christians Engage New Media"),
• awards (The Best of the Blogs Award, The Weblog Awards),
• professional associations (International Blogging and New Media Association--although just in its infancy),
• a journal (Blogger & Podcasting),
• a related research organization/thinktank (Society for New Communications Research), or
• a $10,000 scholarship for college student bloggers (The Blogging Scholarship)

My point--blogging is here. And not a fringe activity; it's an integrated part of the communication patterns for many people. And we're seeing structure develop around blogging as it becomes even more prominent.

Here are some interesting statistics from the Blog World Expo website:

• Over 12 million American adults currently maintain a blog.
• More than 147 million Americans use the Internet.
• Over 57 million Americns read blogs.
• 1.7 million American adults list making money as one of the reasons they blog.
• 89% of companies surveyed say they think blogs will be more important in the next five years.
• 9% of internet users say they have created blogs .
• 6% of the entire US adult population has created a blog .
• Technorati is currently tracking over 70 million blogs .
• over 120 thousand blogs are created every day .
• There are over 1.4 million new blog posts every day .
• 22 of the 100 most popular websites in the world are blogs .
• 120,000 new blogs are created every day .
• 37% of blog readers began reading blogs in 2005 or 2006 .
• 51% of blog readers shop online .
• Blog readers average 23 hours online each week .