ClappingTree’s Web 2.0

There are 3 things that we need to know about today’s Internet technologies:

FIRSTLY, a powerful GLOBAL CONVERSATION had begun since 1999.

Throughout the World Wide Web, millions of people are now using BLOGS to share opinions, knowledge and personal experiences with blinding speed. Today, traditional marketers, publishing media and even researchers can no longer ignore them. In fact, many have joined the bandwagon. Some quick statistics: The first blog appeared around 1999, yet Technorati currently tracks more than 50 million blogs — this means that the number of blogs has been doubling in size every six months for the past three years! As marketing research giant A.C. Nielsen noted in its BuzzMetrics site, “The Internet, far more than any other medium, has [also] given consumers a voice, a publishing platform and a forum where their collective voices can be heard, shared and researched.”

SECONDLY, email volume on related projects could be down by 75% and meeting times whacked in half… if you use wikis effectively, according to a report by Internet research firm Gartner Group.

So what are wikis? The most famous example is Wikipedia, a free online encyclopedia that is now more than twice the size of Encyclopedia Britannica. Basically, wikis are content management systems that allow users to create or edit pages instantaneously, while maintaining a reversible change history. They also allow discussions on the page. As such, they are excellent tools for collaborative writing, problem solving and project management. In the words of CIA analyst Dr Calvin Andrus, “The Wiki and the Blog are complementary companion technologies that together form the core workspace that will allow intelligence officers to share, innovate, adapt, respond, and be on occasion, brilliant… The Blog will be vibrant[and personal], and have many seas [of] changes in real-time. The Wiki, as it matures, will serve as corporate knowledge and will not be as fickle as the Blog.”

THIRDLY, NO licence costs, NO restrictive licences, and NO vendor lock-in are possible and feasible.

We could achieve these using Free/Libre Open-Source Software (FLOSS), also known as “free software” and “open source”. In recent years, FLOSS has been gaining significant marketshare in Web and desktop applications worldwide. According to many studies, mature FLOSS applications actually have high reliability, performance and security as well as good community support. Reason: The FLOSS development methodology, the availability of source code (to examine, verify, modify and innovate) and the large numbers of developers have enabled bugs, performance glitches and security vulnerabilities to be identified and resolved very quickly. FLOSS pioneer Terry Vessels summed it best, “The advances in all of the arts and sciences, indeed the sum total of human knowledge, are the result of the open sharing of ideas, theories, studies and research.”

Course Objectives

Upon completion of the course, you shall be able to:

• Create a blog on a popular blog host, add posts with text, links, graphics, audio, video and comments; and change the settings and templates of your blogs.
• Create a wiki on a popular host, manage wikis pages, adding text, tables, links, graphics, audio, video and comments; and change the settings of your wikis.
• Use RSS effectively as a subscriber.
• Use Google services to search, organize, and share relevant information.
• Discuss meaningfully the “what”, “how” and “why” of using blogs, wikis, and other free software (such as Moodle and Google) to meet the information sharing and training needs of a commercial or educational organization.

Who Should Attend: Anyone who is familiar with Web surfing and wants to learn about the use of blogs, wikis and free open-source software. Managers, executives or trainers who want to facilitate reflective and/or collaborative learning. No programming knowledge needed.

Course Duration: 2 days

To Register: Visit the NTU CCE site, choose the right course and date, scroll to the bottom and click the “Register Here” link.