Current Mood:
Happy
I’m in love with a new gadget. Yes, I realize I love many electronic gadgets, but the MyTouch (MT3G) takes the cake. I recently received mine in the mail (Thanks pre-order) and I haven’t put it down since!
The device is slim, responsive and downright beautiful. Here are some specs on the new beauty.
- Battery: Li – Ion, 1340 mAh
- Camera: 3.2 megapixels Resolution
- Internet: Full HTML Browser
- Network: GSM Quad-band phone capable of global roaming (850/900/1800/1900 MHz) UMTS dual-band global 3G (1700/2100 MHz)
- OS: Android
- Resolution: 320 x 480 pixels
- Size: 4.45 x 2.19 x 0.58 inches (113 x 56 x 15 mm)
- Standby: 600 hours (25 days) of Stand-by time
- Talk: 6 hours (360 mins) of Talk time
- Touch Screen: 3.2-inches
- Voice: Dialing, Commands, Recording, Speaker Phone
For comparison purposes, the MT3G is slightly smaller and skinnier than the iphone. That means the screen is .3 inches smaller, but you really don’t notice it. The Android OS really does get the most out of its small screen real estate. In my opinion the MT3G accomplishes that feat by offering completely customizable screens. With a MT3G you can place Widgets and Apps wherever you like, making it easy to reach the things you use most. For example, I have Facebook, Twitter and RSS news feeder on one screen and a dialer, camera, camcorder, and gallery on another. For a control freak like me, it’s AWESOME being able to group widgets and apps on different screens. You also have the option of keeping widgets in a drawer that conveniently flips up as well.
Aside from the Android OS, I’m also a fan of the keyboard. I’ve had a physical keyboard forever, so I thought it would take me a while to get used to an on-screen keyboard. Not the case. Android has a smart word choice bank built in and it’s super intuitive. I got the hang of it in less than a day. Just like the iphone, the android can rotate its keyboard for a landscape mode (much preferred by the way!)
For those of you wondering about Apps, never fear! The Android Marketplace is near! Practically any quality app you can find for the iphone exists in the Android Marketplace. The nice thing is that the majority of android apps are free. I’ve already installed a plethora of interesting apps that boost my productivity. Speaking of productivity, I’m in LOVE with the synchronization of my Google apps. Everything is seamlessly integrated!
In terms of hardware, I would say the MyTouch far exceeds the iPhone. Not only does it have expandable memory slots (yes I realize they don’t go that large), but it also boasts a removable battery. This way, when your phone craps out on you, you don’t have to consider the whole thing dead (like you do the iphone). Just get a new battery and you’re good to go! Another bonus? You can run more than one app at a time. I can successfully have three things open at a time before the phone starts to revolt.
Another wonderful feature is the GPS capabilities. The MyTouch can turn the GPS function on and off depending on the application it is running at the time. (not sure if the iphone can do this?) Talk about saving battery! The GPS is pretty darn accurate to. I run it quite frequently when I’m driving so I can test it out.
So in conclusion, I’m a true Android lover. I NEVER thought I’d say that because I’ve literally been pining after the iphone for years. Now I can have an iphone-like phone without having crappy service 
I learned a lot at EduWeb 2009 in Chicago. For work I made a list of ideas/takeaways, but I thought I’d add it here real quick!!! I’m sure I’m forgetting something on this list!!! Eduweb was pretty much information OVERLOAD.
Yes, it's true. This is a table that is COMPLETELY filled with laptops. Oh the age of technology! Photo by Opacity on Flickr!!!
Photographer for the picture above is the lovely Anne! Find her here!!!
- Go to where there are existing (and already engaged) DU Communities
- Find them!!!
- Make sure social media presence can be clearly seen on our homepage.
- http://www.oc.edu is great inspiration
- Don’t have our social media accounts be islands.
- Take pictures of Davenport Golf Classic. Take engaging photos
- Make sure there is some kind of photographer at every event. Visuals are important!
- Engage my Facebook audience using the “Discussions” tab. Make them feel like it is their place not yours!
- Create possible sub-groups for LinkedIn
- Continue cross-promotion between Flickr, Facebook, Twitter, Myspace etc.
- Include a narrative report of my social media efforts in my weekly update.
- Keep track of the “emotional successes” that take place during the week.
- Check Google Alerts, and Addictomatic EVERY DAY!
- Make sure social media links get exposure in print materials
- Explore Google analytics more. Specifically the “Site Overlay” function in the web content area.
- Find out where people are clicking most.
- Be better at tagging Flickr photos. Those tags are extremely important!
- Be sure to engage more students in our Flickr group. It really allows for all those small moments “in between” to be captured
- Use a lifestream to keep track of my social media message
- Talk to Alumni relations about Facebook causes (and how it doesn’t really work)
- 25 million people use the Causes application on Facebook. Only 185k actually donated.
- Keep working on “incentives” for participating in our social media efforts
- Keep on top of following those who follow @Davenportu on Twitter.
- Use Google Analytics funnels to better keep track of our brand
- Track urls I post on Twitter
- Revitalize Myspace!
Current Mood: Happy
Presentation by Keidra Chaney and Anne Divita Kopacz, DePaul Univ.
9:47 – DePaul started their social media strategy about a year and a half ago. They use it to build relationships. (which is a common theme around here) For 20 years they didn’t really communicate with their alumni, so they’re trying to turn that around with Social Media.
9:50 – Start building relationships online by going where your alumni already are. Go to existing engaged communities. As alumni relations, use social media to be a friend, not a pitchman.
9:52 – Challenges in starting social media: Integrating with an exisiting communications plan. Dealing with bureaucracy. Establishing measurable goals. Allaying skittishness about privacy/content. Assigning staff to create content. (Social media is about relationships, not numbers)
9:56 – Establish online community guidelines while also remember it’s changing constantly.
9:57 – Common theme? Make sure you put your social media presence on your homepage! Don’t silo it, share it!
10:00 – DePaul launched their Facebook page in January of 08. Content on their page includes: News and event listings, blog post and web links, photos and video. (Note: take pictures of the Davenport Golf Classic for the Facebook page)
10:03 – Engage your alumni using Facebook Discussions.
10:04 – DePaul has 5,700 members for their LinkedIn Alumni group. They saw a HUGE influx in members last year soon after the economy tanked. Make sure you alums feel comfortable networking in LinkedIn.
10:08 – DePaul took a kind of hands off approach for LinkedIn and soon after that it kinda grew. They let them feel like the community is your own. The hands-off approach combined with the general growth helped it evolve into something bigger than they anticipated. People volunteer as mods once they feel that they have ownership and stake in community,
10:10 – Next for DePaul and LinkedIn? Create subgroups for regional chapters. This could work well for Davenport considering we have about 14 different locations!
10:12 – Demon Tracks = DePaul’s staff written blog. Started off as an experiment about a year ago. Since then it’s grown into their main social media hub.
10:18 – DePaul has more than 300 followers on Twitter (this after being on there for abotu 2 months) They use Twitter to link to external stories about DePaul. They can also communicate directly with alumni in “real time.”
10:22 – Use Facebook and Twitter to drive people to your Flickr page. DePaul has 28 group members and about 300 photos. Both alumni and staff post photos to their photostream and group pool. It essentially replaces on-site photo gallery.
10:24 – Current red-headed step child for DePaul? YouTube Channel (used to be Flickr). Their next step is to integrate with other media.
10:26 – Chart O’ Fun. Make sure you cross promote everything! Facebook should feed into flickr and flickr into twitter etc.
10:28 – How to measure??? Facebook Insights, YouTube insights, Flickr Stats, Google Analytics. Each week they give a narrative report of their social media efforts. (Talk about issues of engagement. What are people talking about? What are people responding to) Give numbers of page views etc, but don’t forget the relationships part!!!
10:30 – Where do you find content for your social media accounts? Media Relations, College publications, Print magazines and newsletters, other social media, external news outlets and blogs, google alerts. CREATE YOUR OWN CONTENT.
10:32 – Key Takeaways: 1. Create Strategy 2. Partner with other departments 3. Match media to audience 4. Build relationships and foster conversations 5. Go where alumni are 6. Update content regularly 7. Reuse, recycle, content 8. Measure, Measure, Measure 9. Experiment.
10:42 – Old print media is a great way to let “older folks” know about new media. http://twitpic.com/b7yjv
Presentation by Susan Evans, College of William and Mary
3:21 – What are you goals for the web redesign? Well sometimes you just need to regenerate the usability and information you have on your current site.
3:23 – Transparent communication is important. Stop doing so much work trying to contain information! Be open about the process.
3:24 – 7 Big Steps of redesign. First is Discovery. An assesment of your website. Evaluate the current publications. Clarify your goals and objectives. Review challenges, budgets, and staffing concerns. (Get the big picture) What is your school all about?
3:30 – Step 2: Strategy Developement. Prioritize audiences. Formulate information architecture. Outline creative recommendations, messaging ideas. Sort through policies and procedures. Plan to make it scale. Let your departments know what the purpose of the website is.
3:35 – Step 3: Content Creation. Figure out what exists and what needs to be recreated. Who produces it and who reviews it. Have depts create their own stuff. They’re the ones that know that content best. Just make sure you have someone else review it. Also make sure you settle on a key message.
3:39 – Great idea for content review!! If you have so much content to review, why not have many people review it for you? (anywhere from 30 to 40 people review it.) Have people review dept sites that are not their own.
3:45 – Step 4: Design and Testing. Create a spectrum of design concepts. Survey designs with target audience. Build an entire template suite. Test chosen concept with real users. When you do a focus group, why not have your subjects WRITE down their initial reaction and THEN ask questions. Group mentality will prevent people from saying what they want. When they’re asked to write something down though, they’re more likely to be truthful.
3:56 – Step 5: Tech Specifications. Create a short list of CMS options. Identify/select CMS. Develop functional specifications based on designs. Code. Make sure you can deliver what you say you can provide. If you tell departments they’re going to have a great content management tool, make sure you get them one!
4:00 – Step 6: Implementation + Launch. Test it with lots of people! Also make sure you test functionality in lots of different browers. (including mobile in my opinion) Configure users, roles, workflows. Tie-in additional systems.
4:02 – Have webteam edit top level content, but don’t be afraid to let departments edit their own stuff. Like it’s been said before… depts. know their own content BEST!
4:04 – During the implementation process of the website redesign you need to STOP your day job! This is the BUSY part of it all. Also, when you get to this part of it, just stop communicating. If you don’t, people will still think they have the ability to change things. Not true. You should be so far along at this point that you’re not really open to sweeping changes!
4:09 – Most important thing to remember during website redesign? You can’t please everyone.
Presentation by Melissa Cheater, University Western Ontario
2:03 – Information Architecture maps out your webpage effectively. Maintain a consistency while getting your message out!
2:06 – 85% of students rely on links/menus to find information on your site. Only 15% use search tool. 88% of students said they would drop a school if they couldn’t find what they were looking for on the website.
Information architecture is important for several reason: Cost of finding, cost of not finding, cost of construction, cost of maintenance, cost of training, value of education, value of brand.
2:08 – Use google analytics to find out where people are clicking. Use the “Site Overlay” in the web content area. It helps you see traffic trends. (I need to explore Google Analytics more!!!!)
2:12 – Think about what you want on your homepage? For Davenport we probably want to “advertise” Business, Health, and Technology. Push users where they need to go.
2:18 – Your school’s website NEEDS to incorporate all the pages that aren’t hosted at yourschool.edu . You must include your Twitter, Facebook, Flickr properties. You’re spending time on them, so include them!
2:21 – Link to your social media accounts off of your homepage. In addition, don’t have your social media accounts be islands. Make sure you’re always linking to your properties.
2:27 – Link to your social media accounts off of your homepage. > And vice versa—and AMONG the social-media pages. Then document!
2:37 – Feel like I’m ahead of the game with my fbml tabs! Josh and I worked hard to make an engaging tab for students to click on.
Presentation by Matt Herzberager, Florida International University
12:50 – Social Media tools can help you manage your workflow. (theconversationprism.com)
12:56 – Before, when you took pictures, they just sat on your harddrive. Now when you take a picture you can geotag it, add it to flickr groups etc.
12:57 – Web 2.0 is all about collaboration and creation, but now we need to organize and categorize. There is all this information out there that’s tagged… but there’s no way to sift through it in a coherent manner.
1:00 – There are less errors in wikis than there are in printed encyclopedias. Josh would love to hear this!
1:01 – Google docs are a great way to collaborate with others. Instead of sending dozens of word docs back and forth for one little thing, why not use google docs?
1:03 – You can broadcast an event live by simply using ustream, livestream, mogulus etc. Use this tool to get your institutions message out for cheap!
1:04 – Flickr adds the ability to share and tag photos. Can be used for events. (fosters collaboration) Opening Flickr up to students really allows for those “little moments” in between to be captured.
1:08 – Blogs are a great way to create and share stories. Let your university’s story get out there on your own terms.
1:12 – Any negative mention of your school on Twitter can be turned into a positive message. Respond to them in a kind matter. You may have just helped out one student, but if that student says “Thanks for going above and beyond,” they just broadcast that to their 230 friends.
1:18 – Use a lifestream to keep track of your social media message. Strytlr.com or Revetto, Friendfeed etc.
1:20 – A great example of mapping can be found at Boston University maps. Why not visually show where things are on campus using a map up mashup?
1:22 – Google analytics can be tricky to use, but it’s brilliant. You can track everything you do and see what is most effective for your school.
1:32 – Wikis changes the game in that one person isn’t soley in charge. It opens the funnel up #eduweb.
1:35 – Such a great idea! Start your morning with a cup of coffee and a look at your google reader. Keep track of your alerts and what people are saying about you.
1:39 – People are getting used to hearing the buzzwords “Keyword, Hastag etc” We shouldn’t be afraid to hand things out that have buzzwords on it.
1:40 – Addict-o-matic.com (great way to monitor social media)
Presentation by Michael Rihani, Koofers
9:47 – Web 2.0 is all about user created content. It’s about collaboration. (wordle.net)
9:51 – MIT OpenCourseWare: Free publication of MIT course materials. Echo360.com (software the records your lectures). Cramster.com. All great examples of schools utilizing Web 2.0
9:56 – Social Q&A – Yahoo Answers, Aardvark, Stack Overflow. These are all great examples of using Web 2.0 products to answer questions together.
9:58 – Web 2.0 Participation Inequality! 90% of users are lurkers who never contribute. 9% of users contribute a little. 1% of users account for almost all the action. (don’t I know it!) Example – 25 million people use the Causes application on Facebook. Only 185k actually donated. #eduweb
10:01 – Sometimes you need to give a little incentive to get participation.
10:04 – Textbooks are going digital (which is a good thing!) Rental sites include Chegg.com, Bookrenter.com and Skoobit.com
10:07 – Web 2.0 is changing the way textbooks function. (digital) Could the future be touch tablets? I think so. It will be a place to read, write…. basically do everything you need in a 1lb tablet.
10:12 – With more information becoming public, people are becoming smarter. GPA’s have risen steadily in the past couple of decades.
Current Mood: Happy
Presentation by Aaron Rester, University of Chicago
8:36 – People started using the @ symbol as a means of communication in Twitter. It’s pretty much what kicked it off. When Twitter first emerged, everyone was SUPER confused by it!
8:38 – Most institutions used to see Twitter as a glorified newsfeed. Now they’re seeing it as a way to maintain relationships in a way they couldn’t before.
8:41 – Potential audiences for higher ed twitter (Current Students, Prospective Students, Alumni, Media, General Public). The least important audience for your Twitter account is current students. They’re already plugged into your school. Twitter has yet to catch on with Gen Y. Only 22 percent of this group says they use Twitter.
8:45 – Chicago Law School has something called TweetChicago. It’s their way to let students tell the school’s story.
8:48 – school followers are mostly alums and want to maintain a sense of intellectual engagement w/the school
8:50 – You can use Twitter for media relations and brand management. Shape the way people percieve your school
8:52 – Best reason to get your school on Twitter? It will happen without you. @oberlin is a great example of this. It was set up by a student and everything is fairly good. However, there is potential for disaster.
8:53 – Act II – Get off the ground. 70% just did it and didn’t get approval from supervisors. 24% sought supervisor approval. 3% required to seek approval from VP level. 3% sought approval from president
8:56 – Content: Which audiences are you trying to reach? What kind of content will be most appealing to them? And where will that content come from? Them here… make sure you can maintain what you do. How will your Twitter content be tied into your other web content? UChicagoLaw uses Yahoo Pipes.
9:00 – Who is tweeting for you? Whoever it is… make sure they know the institution. If you have multiple people tweeting for you, discuss the institutional personality. If you have student/faculty tweeters, remember to set guidelines.
9:02 – Only 13% of schools follow everyone that follows them on Twitter. ONly 10% follow no one and 29% follow the community. I think Davenport falls in the middle here. I make sure to follow everyone who is clearly interested in the school (or lives around one of our locations)
9:04 – What tools will you use to monitor your school’s account? Tweet Deck or CoTweet. I personally use TweetDeck and have yet to play with CoTweet. We really don’t have multiple people tweeting so I don’t know if CoTweet is worth it yet.
9:06 – How do you measure ROI? Use Google Analytics funnels, TwitClicks. However the BIGGEST question here is how do you measure “engagement.”
9:09 – Monitoring engagement for each school is different. It’s unquantifiable for the most part.
9:10 – slideshare.net/arester (slides for the presentation)
9:16 – Discussion time in the room! Note to self: Make sure I set up more google alerts and specify them carefully!!! (Davenport University: not Iowa) Advanced search operators are crucial for monitoring conversation on Twitter. Filter out the noise. Work smarter
Presentation by Stewart Foss, eduStyle.net
4:52 – Wow… over 3,000 sites have been added to edustyle.net I’m impressed. That site has really been inspirational for our website redesign though.
4:53 – What is the purpose of your homepage? It’s to help users find the information they are looking for.
4:55 – Instead of demolishing your entire website, why not just fix some of the common problems? This is called incremental redesign. Research, Tweak, Repeat. It’s easier to ask forgiveness than to get permission. You won’t need forgiveness though. You’re going to do this right!
4:56 – Research using articles and conferences, web statistic data, surveys, and user testing.
4:58 – Use the website to introduce your institution and its strengths. Have your homepage say “visually” what your school is about! (say it in text as well) Although don’t include too much “market-ease.” That turns people off!!
5:01 – Your homepage is your prime real estate!!!! Uni of Notre Dame takes advantage of that!!! (cool, interesting, and informational) #eduweb
5:03 – Photography on your website is important!!! Take pictures of what is actually happening on campus. Posed shots are ok. Real life shots are even better! I’m feeling inspired to take photos on campus!!!
5:06 – Battles about what is on a homepage is a “blood fued.” However, it is inevitable you will lose some of those battles. You must think critically about how you’re going to fit in that extra link.
5:08 – Search Placement is IMPORTANT. The reality is that SOMEONE is going to have an issue with your navigation so you must make sure they can find your search bar! Most everyone has their search bar in top right hand corner.
5:11 – Be CAREFUL with color! Some colors look great on jerseys and shirts… but it DOES NOT translate to web. (Indian Hills Community College) It’s not the colors that are bad… it’s their use on the website.
5:15 – Colors evoke feeling. Blue = cold. If your website is designed using just blue, your website will seem cold. Pick colors that go with your message.
5:17 – #1 problem with in higher ed web design is spacing and font! Don’t blur things together with bad line height. Headings, lists, bold, italics can help seperate things for the user. (makes it easier for your user to scan through the website)
5:22 – Consider your ability to maintain anything you add. Example… one school added a news section because everyone else had one. However, it was only updated every once in a while because there was no news!
5:25 – Check out other higher ed websites for inspiration. However, don’t be afraid to think outside the box. It’s a good idea to look at websites from other industries! (smashing magazine)
5:34 – Designing for mobile web? Research to see how many people are using mobile browsers. You can make some judgement calls off of that. If a small number of people use mobile browsers, it might not be worth your time to redeisn for mobile.
5:37 – One university live steams their Twitter feed on the homepage. That’s awesome in my opinion! http://www.okwu.edu/
Presentation by Dimitri Glazkov, Google
2:19 – Dmitri says the next big thing is going to be on the web. Hmmm… kinda gathered that. The web rocks!
2:20 – The web basically shut down when Michael Jackson died. Dimitri has coined this the Michael Jackson effect. I like it!
2:23 – How was Flickr born? It was a basic supply chain. They utilized technology that made uploading photos easier.
2:25 – Fundamentally the web is hard. It’s a “spaghetti mess.”
2:27 – There are many different people solving the SAME problem in SOOOO many different ways!! It’s crazy. There’s tons of noise and overlap with everyone saying their technology is best. How many diff ways are there to make drop down menus… how many different java script libraries are there?? WHY?
2:30 – Solution? Play better. We need to get better at the game of the web. To do that we need to make the web work faster. (improvements to browser start up time.) We also need to be more compatible. We spend so much time making technology work with a plethora of browsers. It’s stupid! Just have a standard.
2:33 – Open source/participation is really important for the health of the web.
2:36 – Change the game by making offline web apps and geotagging.
2:38 – Devices that hook us to the web are getting smaller and smaller. We don’t use desktops that often anymore. The web is changing. It’s everywhere.
2:45 – 3D capabilities are come. People won’t necessarily be making 3d models anymore. They can now be built using javascript in the webpage! No more boxy designs for the web.
2:50 – Dmitri is showing of 3d css. It’s quite impressive and exciting. It will change the way the web is. I can’t even BEGIN to imagine what the web will look like for my children!
2:52 – 3d css. It’s making me dizzy! Yikes. Here’s a look at some examples. http://webkit.org/blog/
2:56 – Most of the bad things (hackers) happen in javascript. We need a more secure web. We need to build better browsers that are more secure and can protect us from being exploited.
2:57 – We don’ tknow what the next big thing is. We just know that someone “is in granny’s basement” creating it.
2:58 – Q&A time! Talking about HTML5. Unfortunately, I don’t know much about it 
3:01 – “What point do you see browser manufacturers catching up with standards?” Dmitri – I don’t know.. the pressure is on and it’s up to us to put it on. Many browsers are just playing catch up right now.
3:06 – “What is the next big thing in search?” Search is just a web application. It needs to be more interesting on the browswer side. (that’s what Dmitri says)
3:09 – I’m starting to think I’m going to burn myself out by live blogging, tweeting, checking twitterfall, and tweet deck all at the same time.
