transcript

Transcript: Online Photo Sharing in Plain English

leelefever — Wed, 9 Jan 2008 14:50:10 -0500

The following is a transcript of the Common Craft Show video: Online Photo Sharing in Plain English.

When asked what should be saved in a fire, along with family and pets, people often choose photos. If photos mean a lot to you, it's time to learn why keeping them on the web makes sense.

This is online photo sharing in Plain English

As you know, cameras and photography have changed. What used to appear on paper, now appears on computers and phones. No matter the format, we still love our photos and now they they have new powers.

First, let's be practical.

These days a fire may not be your biggest worry - a computer failure can destroy 1000s of memories. You can avoid this by keeping your photos backed up on the internet. A number of sites make it inexpensive and easy for you to upload your photos for safe keeping.

Now, because photos can be uploaded to a web site, all sorts of cool things are possible.

To make our point, lets looks at the old way...

You visit the Grand Canyon and take beautiful photos. You get them developed and a few days later add them to a photo album that sits on a shelf. Few people see them and it's a pain to find a specific photo in all those albums. BOOOO.

Now, let's look at the new way with a popular service I use called Flickr.

You visit the Grand Canyon and take beautiful photos with a digital camera. Once you're home, you move the photos onto your computer and then upload them to the Flickr website. You just click upload, find the photos on your computer and upload them to the web for safe keeping. Ahh, sweet peace of mind. YAAAY

But it doesn't stop there. You need to make sure that it's easy to find photos in the future. Along with adding titles, you can add keywords or tags that describe the photo. You might use tags like grandcanyon, arizona, park, scenery, 2007 to describe this photo. Each of these tags becomes a way for you to find photos in the future. Just click a tag and 1000 photos becomes 5 related ones.

Now, once your photos are online and findable, it's time to look at another fun part of online photo sharing - the actual sharing.

You can choose to make your photos public or private - it's up to you. Private is like a photo on your wall - few see it. But public is like taking your photos to a party - they become a representation of you and offer a way to make friends.

So, try sharing your online photos with the public. Here's what to expect:

Friends and even strangers may leave comments on your photos.
You can see which of your photos are most popular

You may even discover that you're more motivated to take photos because you want to share them with the world.

So, photo sharing sites like Flickr do two things really well:

1) They keep your photos safe, organized and findable
2) They make photo sharing fun by making photos social

At the very least, back up your photos online, but if you're ready for fun, open your photos to the world and start to feel the love.

You can get started at Flickr Webshots or Photobucket.com

I'm Lee LeFever and this has been online photo sharing in plain english on the common craft show.

Transcript: Blogs In Plain English

leelefever — Fri, 30 Nov 2007 03:14:48 -0500

You’ve seen the word, you've seen the web sites and you may even have one. But have you ever wondered: What's the big deal about blogs?

This is blogs in plain English.

To make sense of blogs, you have to think about news and who makes it. We'll look at news in the 20th vs. the 21st century to make our point.

In the 20th century, the news was produced professionally. When news happened, reporters wrote the stories and a tiny group of people decided what appeared in a newspaper or broadcast. Professional news was mainstream: general and limited.

The 21st century marked the point where news became both professional and personal. A new kind of web site called a weblog or blog came onto the scene that let anyone be a reporter and publisher - often for free.

As blogs became popular, they created millions of news sources and gave everyone an audience for their own version of news.

Of course, we're using the word "news" loosely. But really - isn't everything news to someone? With a blog...

A business owner can share news about his business
A mother can share news about her family
A sport star can share news with fans
These people are all "bloggers"

How did this happen?
Well, blogs made sharing news on the web easy. Anyone with an idea can start a new blog with the click of a button and share news minutes later. Here's how blogs work.

Blogs are websites that are organized by blog posts - these are individual news stories, like articles in the paper. Bloggers simply fill out a form like this to post a new story. With the click of a button, the blog post appears at the top of the web page, just above yesterday's news. Over time, the blog becomes a collection of these posts, all archived for easy reference.

Also, Each blog post can become a discussion through comments left by readers. Blogs make the news a two way street.

But really, the fuss is not about how blogs work - it's what people like you do with them that matters.

Let's say you have a blog about green living and outdoor photography. It reflects your unique perspective. This helps you build relationships with your readers and other bloggers with similar interests.

Speaking of relationships, bloggers often work together. In addition to comments,You'll read each other's blogs, quote each other and link your blogs together. This creates communities of bloggers that inspire and motivate each other.

Whether it's their ease of use or the opportunities they enable, blogs have been adopted in a very big way.

Since 2003, there have been over 70 million blogs created, each with it's own version of news. So, the big deal about blogs is that they gave people like you the power of the media and created a personal kind of news that appeals to a high number of small audiences.

So, it's up to you - what will you do with this new power? There is likely a group of people out there who want to hear what you have to say.

You can search for blogs at:

blogsearch.google.com
technorati.com

Or start your own blog for free at:

Blogger.com
Wordpress.com

I'm Lee LeFever and this has been Blogs in Plain English on the Common Craft Show.

Help Translate the Google Docs Video on DotSUB

leelefever — Fri, 21 Sep 2007 19:55:50 -0400

We've been friends and fans of dotSUB since we first started making video for The Common Craft Show. They make it easy for videos to be translated into multiple languages via subtitles.

The RSS in Plain English video has been translated into 20+ languages on dotSUB. A truly useful and innovative service.

I've gotten permission from the Google Docs team to share the Google Docs video on dotSUB so it's acessible for the hearing impaired and our non-English speaking friends.

Are you bi-lingual? Multi-lingual? Please help us get the Google docs video translated. All you need is a dotSub account and a visit to the video's page (right side) to start the translation.

Here's the video in the dotSUB player - you can click the arrows at the bottom to see other languages (once the translations are complete).

Help Translate the Google Docs Video on DotSUB

leelefever — Fri, 21 Sep 2007 19:55:50 -0400

We've been friends and fans of dotSUB since we first started making video for The Common Craft Show. They make it easy for videos to be translated into multiple languages via subtitles.

The RSS in Plain English video has been translated into 20+ languages on dotSUB. A truly useful and innovative service.

I've gotten permission from the Google Docs team to share the Google Docs video on dotSUB so it's acessible for the hearing impaired and our non-English speaking friends.

Are you bi-lingual? Multi-lingual? Please help us get the Google docs video translated. All you need is a dotSub account and a visit to the video's page (right side) to start the translation.

Here's the video in the dotSUB player - you can click the arrows at the bottom to see other languages (once the translations are complete).

Help Translate the Google Docs Video on DotSUB

leelefever — Fri, 21 Sep 2007 19:55:50 -0400

We've been friends and fans of dotSUB since we first started making video for The Common Craft Show. They make it easy for videos to be translated into multiple languages via subtitles.

The RSS in Plain English video has been translated into 20+ languages on dotSUB. A truly useful and innovative service.

I've gotten permission from the Google Docs team to share the Google Docs video on dotSUB so it's acessible for the hearing impaired and our non-English speaking friends.

Are you bi-lingual? Multi-lingual? Please help us get the Google docs video translated. All you need is a dotSub account and a visit to the video's page (right side) to start the translation.

Here's the video in the dotSUB player - you can click the arrows at the bottom to see other languages (once the translations are complete).

Help Translate the Google Docs Video on DotSUB

leelefever — Fri, 21 Sep 2007 19:55:50 -0400

We've been friends and fans of dotSUB since we first started making video for The Common Craft Show. They make it easy for videos to be translated into multiple languages via subtitles.

The RSS in Plain English video has been translated into 20+ languages on dotSUB. A truly useful and innovative service.

I've gotten permission from the Google Docs team to share the Google Docs video on dotSUB so it's acessible for the hearing impaired and our non-English speaking friends.

Are you bi-lingual? Multi-lingual? Please help us get the Google docs video translated. All you need is a dotSub account and a visit to the video's page (right side) to start the translation.

Here's the video in the dotSUB player - you can click the arrows at the bottom to see other languages (once the translations are complete).

Transcript: Social Bookmarking in Plain English

leelefever — Tue, 7 Aug 2007 03:11:18 -0400

The text below is a transcript from the Common Craft Show video: Social Bookmarking in Plain English.

It's just too much. Did you know that there are over 15 billion web pages? To make sense of it all, we need to pluck out the best pages and save them for later.

We have choices. We could bookmark or add to favorites in our web browser. Nah, it quickly becomes messy. Plus, these bookmarks are tied to only one computer. This is the old way.

There's a new way that doesn't use a browser. It uses a website. This is called a social bookmarking site, and the one we'll use today is called Delicious. It makes bookmarking more useful and fun.

We'll focus on three things: How to get started with bookmarking, how bookmarks are organized by tags, and why this kind of bookmarking is social.

First, go to delicious.com to sign up for a free account. While you're signing up, you'll see an easy to add a couple of buttons to your browser.

These are important. The Tag button is how you'll add new bookmarks to the website. On any website, you can click Tag to save that site as a delicious bookmark. Easy!

Consider this example, you are a teacher who often uses the web to find math lessons for 8th graders. You're overwhelmed by all the sites. There are just too many to remember. Using delicious, remembering sites is as easy as tagging them. Here's one. Oh nice, perfect.

Here's what happens when you tag a site: a new window opens and asks for more information. You can add keywords or tags that describe the site. These will help you find bookmarks later. You might tag this site, algebra, bestof, tutorial, math, and homework, then click save to save it on the delicious website.

When you save a page like this, two things happen. First, the site is saved with all your other bookmarks on delicious.com. Second, the tags are saved in a list of all your tags. You just repeat this process for every site you want to save. This is bookmarking.

Let's fast forward two months to make our second point: Why tags are so important. Let's say you now have a hundred bookmarked sites. Chaos, right? Well, since your added tags, you have a way to sort the bookmarks by the tags you assigned.

To find all your sites about algebra, you click the algebra tag, and voila, one hundred becomes three. All your bookmarks are now more findable thanks to tags. But that's only part of the fun. Now, let's look at the social part of bookmarking to make our third point.

Think about your fellow teachers. Couldn't they benefit from seeing your bookmarks? Well, they can. Delicious bookmarks are public. This means your friends and peers can see your bookmarks and use your tags just like you. That's why this is called social bookmarking. Your bookmarks can benefit other people.

Think about it this way. You start bookmarking algebra sites, and your peers can see the interesting sites you find. Then, they start bookmarking too. Within a few weeks, a group of teachers are all bookmarking their favorite math websites, and because they're all public, everyone discovers new and relevant material.

Together you create a network that produces a steady stream of interesting and useful websites, all organized by tags on the delicious website. The lesson is that social bookmarking sites take a world of chaos and make it orderly.

Remember there are three steps to get started. First go to delicious.com to sign up and add the buttons to your browser. Second, start bookmarking sites with tags. And third, be social. Notice how useful and fun other people's bookmarks can be.

I'm Lee LeFever, and this has been Social Bookmarking in Plain English on the Common Craft Show.