I had posted before about SlideRocket and how kewl and shiny it is (I still think its cool and shiny) but now I've also done an initial glance at 280 Slides and while it may be a bit less shiny..I think that users might find it more comfortable to use. 280 has a less flashy tool set than SlideRocket but excels in exposing its capability to export presentations to PPT 2007, PPT 97-2004, Open Document or PDF. I also love the way that you can publish your slides to Slideshare from within 280, email it or get a link and/or embed code. I like the "Notes" feature and the ability to suck in video and photos not just from your desktop but from the Web as well. I think that between the two, folks who like Keynote or who want to do Keynote-like presentations will like SlideRocket and folks who are interested in going quite so edgy and who are interested in ensuring that they have local copies of their slides will gravitate to 280. I like 'em both....

(LINK) Check out #1: "Read at least 100 blogs regularly. Not every post, but a variety. Extra hint: go OUTSIDE your particular passion circle." ..and #22 "Thank people endlessly. Be so full of humility and thanks and gracious awe at the fact that people share time with you (while not being one of those put-down artists) that your work comes off as perpetually fresh and energized and useful."

(found via TechCrunch) On one level, SonicSwap is a service that makes use of YouTube's API to allow users to upload their iTunes playlists and play songs and videos via YouTube's API. But now all that good brain fertilizer from the SCORM 2.0 workshop has me thinking....so we build this platform...YouTube for learning...and then we publish the API and people can use the platform and can assign rights using the platform...and others can pull objects thru the API via the platform...now I haven't gotten the iTunes piece figured out yet....but I'd love to see more innovation like this and like Udutu's work  in our maket space....so what gets your vote for most innovative learning tool?

I need to get better at being able to track down stuff I find via Twitter so I give credit where credit is due...so whoever started this....thanks! I just wanted to list some of the resources for creating comic strips and the like: Strip Creator: Used to create the strip at the left...couldn't figure out though if I was supposed to be able to save the image or what.... MakeBeliefsComix: needs some UI work....couldn't figure out how to resize the thought/word balloons in order to be able to see the characters... Pixton: Looks really sophisticated but these clauses from the TOS give me great pause:"By making Submissions to the Website, you hereby assign and transfer to PCI all your respective rights, titles and interests worldwide in, to and associated with your Submissions, including copyrights, trade-mark rights, and all other intellectual property rights, free and clear of all liens, encumbrances and interests of third parties.         PCI hereby grants you a limited license to use your Submissions for non-commercial purposes. In the event you wish to use your Submission for any commercial purposes, you must first contact PCI and seek its express written agreement to do so." ...I'd rather have a more straight forward relationship...some subscription model.... Speech Bubble Generators List from AllWebDesign: now what do you think you'll find here? :-) ..and another cartoon bubble editor...

Take a gander at this part of InSTEDD's mission: "InSTEDD works with universities, corporations, international health organizations, humanitarian NGOs and communities. Together, we work to identify or craft and then field test technologies for better data collection and analysis, more efficient communications, and more effective response. InSTEDD will, for example, be adapting new social networking capabilities for humanitarian coordination, and testing inflatable satellite dishes able to be carried in a backpack. InSTEDD’s mission is to discover, develop, test, deploy and share information about technologies that buy critical time. Through better disease detection and response times, outbreaks can be contained and possibly prevented. Through better disaster response, more lives can be saved. Through collaboration better answers can be found." ...wow...makes you wonder...if people like this can dream big about the impact that technology could have on responding to disasters - can we dream bigger about what learning can do?

Training as a competitive advantage.... "IBM, which expects to unveil better-than-expected quarterly figures, has announced it will spend some of its cash on incentives to encourage some of its largest partners to invest more in training and other areas. On Wednesday, the company introduced a scheme to help its business partners who are cooperating on its New Enterprise Data Center strategy. The scheme involves incentives for IBM partners to improve their knowledge in three specific areas: virtualization and consolidation; energy efficiency; and business resiliency." Imagine...using your own internal money to train your customers to use your systems and push technology forward...

Kongregate, my favorite place for demonstrating the endless variety of Flash-based game potential (currently 8,334 free games), is now hosting a tutorial section designed to teach you how to build Flash-based games. They provide a side-scrolling game called "Shoot!"...so you play the game, then you download the source code, and off you go. Currently they have three tutorials up with 6 more in the pipe. I love this - how smart is Kongregate being?

How about "Second Life gets its suit on!"? Or..."Hey, Its take your virtual world to work day!"? Er..."Your avatar got so drunk at the holiday party...?" Help me out here. What we have are multiple channels (Virtual World News, Massively), including official ones from River Runs Red and Linden Lab, bringing us the news that Immersive Workspaces 2.0 has launched. This news has a couple of important points I think. First, it links Second Life (SL) with Immersive Workspaces 2.0 - a 2D environment that integrates tools such as screen-sharing, media sharing, note taking, polls, room scheduling and more that businesses will easily be able to see the utility in. Second, and perhaps more importantly, this moves Linden a step closer to a true, behind-the-firewall solution.While the articles do indicate that this solution allows an enterprise to set up a virtual space that is not connected to the main SL grid in anyway - that's not the same as having an instance running behind the wall. A well-played move is that Rivers Run Red has explained "that if customers buy into IWS 2.0, upgrades toward that end down the line will be included. That future proofing is part of the ROI that Rivers is pushing."  The only lingering doubt I have is one related to design. As I watched the video, I kept asking myself "what on earth do I need the 3D for?" I still think there is a design gap here. I mean honestly, we still have people putting a "Next" button in the lower right-hand corner of page-turning HTML courses and now we want to go 3D? There is a place for this...but please, let's think it through first.

(story link)**As an aside, I love the new editing UI in Typepad...good job guys!So IBM is releasing something called OpusUna (which means something like "work as one"); "OpusUna enables participants to collaborate and communicate from within the same browser space, incorporating widgets, audio, and video cameras to display themselves on the screen. IBM envisions, for example, collaboration on patient care via sharing of medical images. Financial traders also could collaborate from around the world."Right now I guess its only working in Safari...??Anybody know any good change management or org dev conferences? I think I really need to hit some of those to see if our thinking about organizations and how they function is keeping anything close to the pace of tech advances....

thnx to a tweet from @cogdogblog...these are just gorgeous