I sent this email out to my technoLOTE email discussion group, but thought I should probably post it here as well.
Here we go:
Delicious is a social bookmarking service. Rather than saving your favourites in your browser and only being able to access them on the one computer, you save them to an online account. The social part comes in when you add other people’s accounts to your network. The great thing about Delicious is that you can see who is bookmarking the same sites as you, and so then you can check out their links and find even more great resources.You can see my delicious account by going to: http://deli.cio.us.technolote. Another delicious account to note is this one: http://del.icio.us/other_than_english Have a look at these sites to get a feel for what deli.icio.us is and what it does.
Check out this post on technoLOTE called ‘Social Bookmarking - Simply Delicious’ where I have written about exactly what Delicious is and why you would use it. There is also a short video there called ‘Social Bookmarking in Plain English’ which gives a fantastic explanation. At the bottom of the post there are links to video tutorials about how to set up a Delicious account.
Skype is a program you download to your computer (it’s free!), create an account, find other people who have skype, add them as contacts and then you can make free phone calls to them. You can also send chat messages. It’s much like MSN, only better. My fabulous colleague, Anne Mirtschin, has written a blog post about why she loves skype. Click here to read what she has to say. Here is a list of things you need to know about Skype that Anne wrote:
Here are 10 facts you may need to know:-
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Skype is VOIP (voice over internet protocol) and its use is free if it is calls are made computer to computer.
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Equipment: skype software (download from www.skype.com) , headset with microphone, or desktop mic, a webcamera (for videoconferencing if you want to, but not essential), IWB or datashow for projecting the video (if for classroom use not needed for personal computer use of course!), user names (equivalent of phone numbers) of contact people
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User friendly, quick loading (sometimes falls over but getting more reliable all the time)
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Neat search facility to add other users to contact list
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Chat or audio can take place. It is polite to send a request message via chat first, to ensure that person you are contacting is not in class or otherwise engaged. (My laptop has embarrassed me on several occasions by ringing, in class)
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Conference calls: both audio and chat. Currently, videoconferencing can only be used between two users. The video aspect cuts out after a third person enters the conversation.
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Chats can be saved with appropriate title, by bookmarking. Goto chats>bookmarked chats and enter a title whilst in skype conversation) or goto recent chats and it tends to save automatically, but with a non categorised title.
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Can buy credit to ring landlines locally, domestically, overseas (extremely cheap overseas calls)
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Constantly requesting feedback as to quality of calls, and working on improving the service. (Sometimes line quality is not high, delays but these are getting less over time.)
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Number of users is restricted to, I think, 10 and then a bridge phone number must be given.
Hint: If using it for the first time, experiment with a friend or colleague after work hours, to ensure you know how it works before trying it in a 3way (or more) chat or videoconference setting.
My Skype username is jess.meyer - add me to your list and I’m happy to have a chat with you to test out your new toy! Skype is a great way of collaborating and staying in touch really quickly and easily. Skype me soon!
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