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The Learning Content Development System (LCDS) is a tool that enables you to create high quality, interactive, online courses.
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Searches Digg, del.icio.us, Technorati, newsvine.com, Google news, Yahoo! news, Flickr, Photobucket, Youtube, Metacafe, Revver, eBay, Amazon.com
Links for 2008-05-10 (del.icio.us)
May 10, 2008 · No Comments
→ No CommentsCategories: bookmarks
Disillusionment with Second Life
May 9, 2008 · No Comments
As I mentioned last month in a post on Hype Cycles, as long ago as last August people were suggesting that Second Life had entered the Trough of Disillusionment. That is certainly true for me. I haven’t been spending nearly as much time in SL this spring as last summer and fall. (Part of that is due to a family matter.) In addition, I’ve been extremely disappointed since I downloaded that latest viewer (1.19.1.4) a couple of weeks ago. Objects are rezzing more slowly, and some of my clothing (and hair) hasn’t rezzed at all since then.
On May 1, I submitted a ticket about the issue, and I finally received a reply yesterday, May 8, informing me that there was a known bug with skirts rezzing, which was a problem with textures not attachments, and stating at the top, “We have solved your issue.” Some solution! There was no indication of when or how the bug would be fixed.
I would certainly be willing to explore another virtual world if there’s one out there that doesn’t have so many problems and runs in a web browser.
→ No CommentsCategories: second life
Searchme
May 8, 2008 · No Comments
Searchme is a new search engine currently in a public beta stage. According to the About page,
Searchme lets you see what you’re searching for. As you start typing, categories appear that relate to your query. Choose a category, and you’ll see pictures of web pages that answer your search. You can review these pages quickly to find just the information you’re looking for, before you click through.
Here is the home page in the day and night themes:
When I typed in “crop circles,” before I even hit Enter, the following categories appeared below the input box: ufos, astronomy, nonfiction, music, dvds, jewelry, online forums, and blogs. There is also an option for searching all the categories.
Instead of a list of websites, you get pictures of the pages. If you move your cursor over one of the pictures, information about the page pops up, and your search terms are highlighted. You can use the scroll bar at the bottom of the page or the wheel on your mouse to move through the pages.
If you click on the arrow in the box at the bottom center, a list of the site will also appear. You can move through the list using the scroll bar at the right.
I think Searchme has a lot of promise.
→ No CommentsCategories: research · search engines
Links for 2008-05-05 (del.icio.us)
May 5, 2008 · No Comments
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Active Worlds, the web’s most powerful Virtual Reality experience, lets you visit and chat in incredible 3D worlds that are built by other users.
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the online virtual world that is your everyday hangout
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This web guide features useful information and resources for virtual environments (also known as virtual worlds, CVEs, MUVEs, or MMOGs). This rapidly growing area has been of recent interest to educators, researchers, corporate trainers, businessmen, and
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The Simple Spark Catalog is the place to find all of the really cool web applications, or “apps” that will become an integral part of your life online.
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Boolify makes it easier to for students to understand their web search by illustrating the logic of their search, and by showing them how each change to their search instantly changes their results.
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Addictomatic searches the best live sites on the web for the latest news, blog posts, videos and images.
→ No CommentsCategories: bookmarks
Links for 2008-05-03 (del.icio.us)
May 3, 2008 · No Comments
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An online library of free videos for learners everywhere - find resources to help you learn just about anything, meet people who make a difference in their communities, and even discover new parts of the world.
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Links for 2008-05-02 (del.icio.us)
May 2, 2008 · No Comments
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Podscope lets you search the spoken word for audio and video that interests you.
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Vaestro is audio forum software that you can use on your web site for free.
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Projjex™ is a collaborative task management service. It offers a simplified approach to managing projects for small and medium sixed teams.
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free and open source resources that can help you to write, edit and organize your work
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Snipp.TV is an innovative multimedia search engine, designed to search for multimedia content on the web by using combined technologies that enable covering mass amounts of media.
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By allowing users to search across multiple engines and favorite URL’s at the same time (and further save those searches) we strive to not only help you find what you are looking for, but to cut down the amount of “surf time” that it takes to do so.
→ No CommentsCategories: bookmarks
AllPlus
April 27, 2008 · 3 Comments
AllPlus, “The Universal Meta Search and Discovery Engine,” is a relatively new metacrawler that searches for websites, news, images, video, and blogs on Ask, Google, MSN Live, and Yahoo! According to the developers, AllPlus “aims to identify and present the very best search results from the very best information sources on the Web.” They “have developed and integrated powerful Natural Language Processing algorithms in query analysis and refinement, search strategy, relevancy ranking, focused drill-down and exploration of multi-dimensional information spaces.”
I was able to add AllPlus to the search engines in my IE 7 browser, so I’ve been using it a fair amount recently. It’s finicky on occasion, but I like it a lot.
Unlike Live and Yahoo!, AllPlus has a clean home page:
For a test, I used the search terms crop circles. After informing me that it was analyzing the topc 160 results, I got 115 hits. The results page shows a Cluster Tree in a sidebar on the left, like the clusters you get when using Clusty, with options to show more or show all. In the middle are the Web Results, including which search engine(s) had the website listed and, apparently, excluding any sponsored/paid results. In separate boxes on the right are results for News, Images, Video, and Blogs, each with an option for showing more results:
When you click on the Cluster Graph tab at the top of the left sidebar, a window like the following opens:
You can use the slidebar at the bottom to select only clusters (terms) with a certain number of hits or more. The image above shows all the clusters. The one below shows clusters with seven or more results.
You can move the clusters around to get a clearer view. Here’s the first view of the cluster graph after it’s been moved.
The Cluster Graph can also be “docked” on the original results page:
If AllPlus just had thumbnails of the websites it brings back, it would be almost perfect.
→ 3 CommentsCategories: metacrawlers · research · search engines
Links for 2008-04-27 (del.icio.us)
April 27, 2008 · No Comments
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Social media monitoring, buzz tracking, brand measurement and blog trend search (beta)
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Dipity is the easiest way to make and share interactive timelines about the people and things you care about.
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A special program for web publishers, including bloggers, webmasters, and anyone who writes for the Internet. You get complimentary access to the Encyclopaedia Britannica online and, if you like, an easy way to give your readers background of the topics y
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StoryMash, the future of collaborative fiction. A creative writing community for authors, amateur writers, readers and anyone interested in collaborative fiction and collaborative creative writing.
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Searchpickr is a search interface to query hundreds of web search services from one single site.
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Stumpedia.com is a social search engine that relies on human participation to index, organize, and review the world wide web.
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By combining advanced technology with its community of knowledgeable guides, ChaCha provides the answers you need
→ No CommentsCategories: bookmarks
Feast of St. George on Renaissance Island (SL)
April 20, 2008 · No Comments
Feast of St. George
Renaissance Island
Sun. Apr. 27
1:00 to 4:00 p.m. PDT (SLT)
Dancing, jousting, feasting, and fireworks on the newly renovated island
→ No CommentsCategories: Renaissance Island · second life
Hype Cycles
April 19, 2008 · 1 Comment
I ran across this term hype cycle for the first time in a column, “The XML Strategist,” in the April edition of Intercom, STC’s magazine. The Gartner’s hype cycle looks like this one from Global PR Blog Week:
When I first saw the image in the column, I started wondering where different technology I use is in the cycle. In the following chart from a Gartner press release, it looks like Web 2.0 was peaking in 2006 and wikis were entering the trough of disillusionment.
In August of 2007, Neville Hobson reported that according to Gartner’s research chief, Second Life was “moving into a phase of disillusionment.”
→ 1 CommentCategories: IDT · instructional technology · second life · technology · trends · web 2.0 · wiki
