InstantConference to the Rescue

This past Friday I set up a teleconference for all of my presenters who will be speaking at the IQ Visual Mapping Conference to be held on October 3, 2008 in the Greater New York Metro Area. Before I set up the meeting I wanted to be assured that everyone could have access to a high quality audio teleconference. I scoured the internet for such a service and came across InstantConference. InstantConference is a free teleconference service with no startup or user fees. The only costs associated with it are long distance fees which your participants will incur. With today's phone calling plans this should not be too much of a deterrent. Once you set up an account you are given a phone number and access code and a pin number to get you started. Before the teleconference I did a run through with Arjen ter Hoeve in the Netherlands who was able to access the phone call via SkypeOut. It worked famously and so now I was ready to go. I figured if Arjen was able to log in with SkypeOut the rest of my participants would have no trouble.

On the day of the teleconference I dialed in and waited patiently as one by one my colleagues announced their presence. Soon Kyle McFarlin, Chuck Frey, Wallace Tait, Arjen ter Hoeve, Adam Clayman, and myself were engaged in our conference. The audio quality was fantastic and as the conference leader with an account, I was able to have the service record the conference session-this was free as well. This was a great feature since Stephanie Diamond was unable to make the teleconference. The group teleconferenced for over an hour talking about the October 3, 2008 event. All of us are really jazzed up about the event and are looking forward to sharing more information about the conference over the next couple of weeks. Stay tuned for some really exciting developments!

After our teleconference meeting was over within 2 minutes I received an email with summary information about who was in attendance and how the long the meeting ran. In about 15 minutes I received another email with a link to the recorded session which is formatted as an MP3 file. I was able to download the recording and listen to it with iTunes. I forwarded the email to my colleague, Stephanie Diamond who were not able to make it and she was able to listen to the entire meeting- pretty cool. I was totally amazed with the service and would highly recommend it for anyone that has to ad hoc teleconferences. (Note: It would make for a great way to do recorded interviews or podcasts.) Try it out and let me know what you think

Comapping forms Alliance with, MeadWestvaco, results in MeadMap.com

FYI- I know that I had shared this with you earlier but hear is the official announcement of the partnership of Comapping and MeadWestvaco. It is very exciting to see the Web 2.0 developments and companies moving to a software as service model. I'm sure there is more to come in the educational space as NECC 2008 approaches. If you haven't yet tried out online mind mapping applications then here is your opportunity at no risk. So go to MeadMap and use the code: ASTECH01

Press Release:

Comapping has entered into a strategic product development and marketing alliance with Mead^® Consumer and Office Products (www.mead.com), a division of the Fortune 500-company MeadWestvaco, Inc. For more than 130 years, the Mead brand has been synonymous with innovative school supplies, including well-known brands like Trapper Keeper^® and Five Star^®.

For the past year or so, the Comapping team has been working day and night with a dedicated team of Mead experts in developing Comapping for academic use. The result is Mead Map - the first mind mapping application designed with college students, for students to meet their specific needs in real life application of knowledge. Currently, Comapping and Mead Map are very similar in functionality. However, as new features continue to be developed for both programs, users will notice functional differences catering to each targeted user’s needs.

As part of the Mead Map launch, the Mead team is offering a free 30-day trial at www.meadmap.com.

ePerformance

I just listened to Clark Quinn's presentation at ASTD LA (eLearning Strategy Presentation)
which is available online. Clark and I have discussed before the challenges with naming in our world and I was happy to see that he adopted the terminology of eLearning -> ePerformance.

I've talked about ePerformance before in EPSS and ePerformance as well as in a series of articles in Learning Circuits:

• ePerformance Essentials
• ePerformance at Work: Self-Service Action and Development Planning
• ePerformance at Work: eFollowUp

Clark's take on ePerformance looks to have a similar definition. I like the way he stepped through the transition from thinking in terms of courses to thinking about broader uses of technology to support performance. His terminology around elements of what goes into ePerformance is a bit different than what I discussed in the learning circuits articles. The concepts are fairly similar.

One of the end points on Clark's map is what he calls a Performance Ecosystem that he talks through at minute 54 in the talk.



I'm not sure if this is top-down or bottom-up or both kind of adoption. I look forward to continued conversation around the topic of ePerformance. Then he gets into discussion (1:02) around the gist of ePerformance - it's "not about training/learning, it's about empowering performance." He mentions:

Just in time
Just what's needed
Meta-Learning
Informal Learning
Problem solving, creativity, innovation, wisdom

Good stuff Clark.

What to Say When a Colleagues' Family Member Dies

This is fairly off topic for this blog, but this is something that's come up several times recently for me, and I've struggled with it each time. This morning I received a note from a colleague to tell me that their mother died last night and that they couldn't do our scheduled call. I'm always at a loss as to what to say ...

I honestly sat in front of the email this morning trying to figure out what I should be saying. And I rewrote the email a bunch of times. I never felt the words in the email were the right words.

I'm generally okay with saying something about being sorry for their loss (and I truly am). If I know them well enough to know whether they are religious, I will sometimes say that they are in my family's prayers (and they truly are). I wish there was a non-religious way to say the same thing, but I don't know the equivalent.

But those one or two sentences seem inappropriately short given the magnitude of the situation. Maybe it's good to be short? Still it feels hollow.

And I struggled even more with whether to say and what to say about the work / scheduled call. Do you mention anything about it? I wanted to say that our discussions could hold until ???? But it seems wrong to even include that message in the same note. It felt like a rounding error on the important part of the message.

And if you do say something about holding, what's the end of that sentence?

Until you get back? <- Not quite right. It could hold longer if they need it.

Until things return to normal? <- Ouch. No. That's definitely not right.

Until ???

I'm sure that many other people face this same issue. I would appreciate any suggestions, especially sample emails / wording that you would or have used in this kind of situation.

Google Docs Adds Fixed-Width Page View

Google just this past week added a fixed-width page view to GoogleDocs which is sure to make everyone a lot happier about using the word processor for preparing documents. With the fixed-width page view selected from the View menu you can now get to view the document at 100% and know where the page breaks and how your document will print. You can always go back to the normal plain view if you would like- but why bother. With the fixed-width page view you can now get a good perspective on your word processing document and how it will look when printed.

Design for Search

Interesting post by Donald Clark that points to a BCC article -Web users 'getting more selfish'. The article is a bit over the top in terms of headline, but it's main point is:

people are becoming much less patient when they go online. Instead of dawdling on websites many users want simply to reach a site quickly, complete a task and leave.

Hardly selfish really. Most of our activity is looking up information, so the most common use case is search, evaluate, keep, organize. We don't want fluff.

Other tidbits:

Success rates measuring whether people achieve what they set out to do online are now about 75%. In 1999 this figure stood at 60%.

Web users were also getting very frustrated with all the extras, such as widgets and applications, being added to sites to make them more friendly.

In 2004, about 40% of people visited a homepage and then drilled down to where they wanted to go and 60% use a deep link that took them directly to a page or destination inside a site. In 2008, said Dr Nielsen, only 25% of people travel via a homepage. The rest search and get straight there.

I don't think any of this is much of a surprise.

And, by the way, I believe that Donald Clark does a remarkable job of providing links to interesting articles. I would put him up with Stephen Downes in terms of a valuable aggregator. I truly look forward to both of their links each day. If you've not subscribed, you really should.

Online Tutoring - Rapid Growth - New Models

Saw a post that cited predictions about the rapid growth of online tutoring:

Worldwide market for online tutoring is estimated to be in the region of $12 billion.

This is something I've been seeing more of, especially in the high school and college markets where tutoring has been more common. Online models allow for better matching of students to tutors and more cost effective models. One interesting model is social homework help provided by Cramster. It allows students to get help on specific textbook problems and to ask questions that are answered by experts.

I've not heard as much about this in corporate settings. Is coaching following this pattern? Moving online? Finding lower cost options?

Matthew Middleton- Real World Uses of MindManager 7

I had the opportunity to interview Matthew Middleton this past week on how he uses visual mapping tools and techniques to accomplish the work that he does. I find it incredibly interesting to learn how others are using MindManager 7 as well as other visual mapping tools to solve real world problems. You can learn more about the tools and techniques of visual mappng at the October 3, 2008 Conference: IQ Visual Mapping- A Systematic Framework for Business Success. So hold the date and hope to see you at the conference.

Here is some background information on Matthew which I thought you would be interested in knowing. Matthew has been working in I.T. in various roles for about 3 years now,
and is currently working as a Software Tester with PlateSpin ULC (A Novell Company), in Toronto, Ontario. In his spare time, he enjoys cooking, gardening, and blogging about various topics of interest (including visual mapping) at www.matthewmiddleton.ca

----
BSF: Can you share with us the work that you currently do?

MM: I'm currently working on testing several different applications related to managing a physical & virtualized computing environment. In particular, I've been focusing on a tool called PowerRecon that can be used to gather inventory and performance data on systems and use
that data to help determine the appropriate path for physical and virtual migration.

BSF: What was is about the demands of your work that made you gravitate towards using visual mapping and MindManager 7?

MM: When working on software testing, especially when using a session-based method, visual mapping can help keep track of disparate information in a single package. It also allows the viewer to filter some information that may be included, but not necessarily pertinent to their inquiry. For example, I keep track of the versions of various applications related to the test that I'm mapping; they might only be needed in some cases for future reference, but by having that information in a branch that I can easily expand as needed, it keeps every pertinent detail available with a minimum of fuss.

BSF: How has MindManager 7 helped you to solve some of your business problems?

MM: Primarily, it helps those using session-based testing to better track and display the results of our tests. This is particularly helpful when giving an Executive Summary style explanation of what was done; I thread different "paths" taken in the test, which makes it
easier to demonstrate the results.

BSF: How receptive were your coworkers to the idea of using visual maps to convey and present information?

MM: The reception has been mixed, in that some people prefer a more linear description, while others respond better to the visual abstraction of the maps.

BSF: Since you started using MindManager 7 have any of your colleagues jumped on board?

MM: Not specifically, though it certainly piqued the interest of some who had been previously hesitant.

BSF: What would you say are the top 2 or 3 benefits of using MindManager 7 in the work that you do?

MM: The single big feature for me is the timer. When I'm exploring a new feature, I usually give myself a set time to focus on that feature. Another handy feature is being able to attach multiple files to a single idea - when attaching logs to a single thread of a test.

BSF: As a user of visual mapping, what suggestions would you give to other users who are on the fence or just starting out using this tool?

MM: Other people's templates can be a really good jumping off point, but you should be willing to change those templates based on your own needs. For example, I was provided with an great template to start with for session-based testing, but I found that it was time-consuming to enter some of the same data over again or make certain customizations over and over again, and since I was primarily focusing on the same product for most sessions, it was easier for me to simply customize the template to my needs. I also turned my template back in to a more generic model, and posted it for public consumption at Biggerplate



BSF: Can you share a specific application that really attracted you to using MindManager 7?

MM: To be honest, I haven't really applied it to any new uses yet. My main focus thus far has been to find the best way to use mind mapping for software testing, and I've found MindManager 7 to be an excellent tool for that purpose.

BSF: Matthew thanks so much for your time and for sharing your ideas about visual mapping with us.

Blogging Advice - It's Good for You

Just saw this article - Blogging -- It's Good for You. I've added that link to one of the most bookmarked pages on this site: Top Ten Reasons To Blog and Top Ten Not to Blog

Thanks to Donald Clark for pointing to this.

Reminder that Blogging and Social Networking Boosts Your Social Life.

Are we sure we don't want Mandatory Blogging?

Save with an Early Bird Registration to the IQ Visual Mapping Conference

There has been a great deal of excitement and buzz with regard to the October 3, 2008 Conference " Visual Mapping As a Systematic Framework for Business Success. "

And now we are offering a special Early Bird Registration of $375 dollars which is a $50 dollar savings. To take advantage of this savings Click here. Look for Educator & Student Discounts coming soon.

Please share this with your colleagues

On October 3, 2008 come join us for a full day conference on how to use visual mapping to your advantage in your organization. Learn how to take visual mapping to the next level and see just how powerful a tool this can be, to help you reach your personal, academic, or business goals.

The conference will be hosted and led by Brian S. Friedlander, Ph.D. and his professional team of preeminent visual mappers who include: Adam Clayman, Stephanie Diamond, Chuck Frey, Arjen Ter Hoeve, Kyle McFarlin, and Wallace Tait. His assembled team comes from such areas as banking, psychology, manufacturing, business management, marketing and college teaching.


Mindjet is a Corporate Sponsor of the Event

Corporate Social Bookmarking Tools

I was just asked on twitter about using social bookmarking tools that work behind the firewall. I thought I had blogged about this before, but I'm not finding the post.

Here are the social bookmarking tools that I commonly cite in presentations:

• BEA Pathways
• Cogenz
• Connectbeam
• del.irio.us - perl based, very similar to del.icio.us
• IBM Lotus Connections
• Scuttle – Open Source
• WSSsearch - SharePoint add-on

Any others? Good comparisons of these?

I originally included: Jive Software - because I thought they had it, but it appears they don't.

Corporate Policies on Web 2.0

One of the barriers commonly cited during my presentations around eLearning 2.0 (use of Web 2.0 / social media for work and learning) is that organizations often have not established their policies or guidelines around the use of these tools. Unfortunately, companies sticking their head in the sand doesn't do any good. Employees are using these things in some way. Companies need a policy. And most corporate guidelines out there around social media are fairly similar. They generally make each employee personally responsible, they need to abide by existing corporate rules, obey copyright and other IP rules, keep secrets and act appropriately.

I think IBM's policy is a pretty good starting point: IBM Social Computing Guidelines

Updated 6/2/2009.

Other company policies or discussions of guidelines I've seen around blogging, social media, web 2.0:

• United States Airforce (PDF)
• United States Navy (PDF)
• Feedster Corporate Blogging Policy
• Thomas Nelson Blogging Guidelines
• Plaxo Public Internet Communication Policy
• Hill & Knowlton Blogging policies and guidelines
• Yahoo Employee Blog Guidelines
• BBC Blog Guidelines
• Sun's Policy on Public Discourse
• Groove
• What Should Your Corporate Policy Be On Blogs?
• Social Media Policy Musts
• Opera
• Harvard Law School
• GM
  
• IOC Olympic Athletes Blogging Policy (PDF)
• Cisco
• Dell
• Intel
• Gartner
• About.com Samples
• Enterprise: List of 40 Social Media Staff Guidelines

However, I'm not really sure how many organizations have these kinds of policies and who in most organizations establishes them.

If you have good articles, posts, etc. on how to get these established in your organization or stats on how common it is among different kinds of organizations, please point me to them.

In some ways, the question we face is -

If our organization doesn't have an existing policy, is that a fundamental roadblock to using certain kinds of Web 2.0 tools as part of our eLearning 2.0 solutions?

Is it worth our time to try to push for getting a policy established?

Mindjet Acquires JCVGantt- Project Management Software

Mindjet announced today in a Press Release that the company has acquired JCVGantt a project management software application from Gannt Solutions. The marriage of MindManager and JCVGantt provides a strong solution for project management and is an invaluable communication tool. You can now derive the benefits of using MindManager for brainstorming and working out the goals and deliverables of the project and use JCVGantt to develop the timeline, look at resources and figure out the costs. I have reviewed JCVGannt earlier this year and understand the the latest version provides faster synchronization of data from MindManager and more control as to what is included in your Gantt Chart. The true beauty of JCVGantt is how it synchronizes the data from MindManager so that any changes that you make in MindManager are automatically updated in JCVGantt and vice versa. I hope to review the latest release of JCVGantt in the next couple of weeks so stay tuned.

IQ Visual Mapping Conference - October 3, 2008

On October 3, 2008 come join us for a full day conference on how to use visual mapping to your advantage in your organization. Learn how to take visual mapping to the next level and see just how powerful a tool this can be, to help you reach your personal, academic, or business goals.

The conference will be hosted and led by Brian S. Friedlander, Ph.D. and his professional team of preeminent visual mappers who include: Adam Clayman, Stephanie Diamond, Chuck Frey, Arjen Ter Hoeve, Kyle McFarlin, and Wallace Tait. His assembled team comes from such areas as banking, psychology, manufacturing, business management, marketing and college teaching.


The conference will be held on the campus of the College of St. Elizabeth which is centrally located in Morristown, New Jersey, in close proximity to Newark Liberty International Airport and to Manhattan via New Jersey Transit. The entire team will spend the day sharing their insight and strategies to help you derive the benefits of intelligent visual mapping and to enable you to experience the power of visual mapping as your systematic framework for improvement. To Register and for more information about the conference click here. We are also offering a special VIP Networking and Dinner session for a select number of participants- so register early because space is limited. Registration for the full day conference is $425 dollars. The VIP Networking Reception and Dinner is an additional $175 dollars and will take place after the conference.

Presentations to Include:
Project Mapping: Visual Thinking in Project Management
Utilizing Visual Mapping for Personal and Professional Motivation and Goal Setting
Increasing Personal and Business Productivity through Visual Mapping Strategies
Visual Mapping as a Systematic Framework for Business Improvement
Visual Mapping Software- Tools of the Trade
Using Visual Mapping Tools for Marketing Your Business
Using Visual Mapping Tools in Academia

Highlights of the Conference

• Networking with fellow visual mappers
• Learn about the latest trends in visual mapping software
• Learn the tools and techniques of intelligent visual mapping
• Learn how to transform your organization with visual mapping strategies
• Learn how visual mapping can be used to organize your "information economy"
• Learn effective ways to use visual mapping tools in academia and business

Benefits

• Save time with visual mapping strategies
• Streamline your information management techniques
• Monetize your company's "ideas"
• See the big picture by using visual mapping tools
• Learn how visual mapping can streamline processes and business procedures

To Register and for more information about the conference click here.

Mindjet is a Corporate Sponsor of the Event.

Moving to the Blackberry Curve

With my 2 year contract up with Verizon it was now time to take the plunge and move up to a Smartphone. As much as I would have liked to have a iPhone- I'm just not sure that the ATT's coverage is as good in the mountains of New Jersey as is Verizon's coverage. So I stayed with Verizon and waited for the release of the Blackberry Curve complete with a 2 Megapixel camera. After using it for a week I am very impressed with its features and functionality. I have been a long time Palm user and have enjoyed the ability to enter contacts and keep my schedule up to date. My first challenge was to move my contacts and calendar from my Macbook. Research in Motion makes PocketMac available for Mac users which allows you to Synch your tasks, calendar, and contacts from your Mac. After initially having a false start, I did some research to find that there was a new driver for the newer Smartphones. Once I installed the driver I was able to use Apple Synch technology and I was able to move all of my contacts and my schedule to my Blackberry Curve. I now have a very powerful phone complete with internet and email capability along with my contacts and schedule. I can now synch my Curve with my Mac with confidence.

The Curve is a very powerful smartphone with its true strength in the area of emailing. It was a cinch to set up my email accounts on the Curve and within seconds I was receiving my emails from three different email accounts. The Curve easily opened my PDF's and Word attachments which I could zoom in to read. My only disappointment is that the latest version of VZNavigator-Traffic Enhanced, which I recently blogged about does not currently run on the Curve. When I called Verizon they informed me that it would be available but there was no time frame given for its release. While I can use the older version of VZNavigator there are a lot of missing features which I really enjoyed using. Having a larger screen on the Curve makes using the VZNavigator much more enjoyable. So far using the Curve has been a very pleasant experience and having access to GPS, internet, email, contacts and schedule in one package has really been wonderful!

Depressing Facts - Prisoners More Common than Active Contributors

Just saw Pew Report - One in 100: Behind Bars in America 2008. That statistic is downright sad, distressing - some truly depressing facts in the report. It also really caught my attention because of my recent post around the 90-9-1 Rule.

So, a higher percentage of people are in prison out of the US population than actively contribute in any given population?

Can that be right?

Prisoners are more common than active contributors?

Dissertation Wiki

Karyn is asking for help via a post on her blog - So, how did you get started... and what difference has it made? Basically, it's about the use of Social Media by learning professionals. She is looking for first had experiences. I hope she's successful in finding them and publishing about them.

She also made one comment that was very interesting:

To the consternation of my rather conservative university, I am submitting the dissertation in the form of a wiki (although - strictly speaking - is it really a wiki if I don't open it up to the community to co-author, which of course I can't do in this instance).

First, I can't imagine trying to do a dissertation wiki. The issues with getting it into a format ready for print publication would be daunting. But that aside ...

You can't open it up? What's the dividing line? You are certainly allowed to get comments, suggestions, etc. on it. After all, that's what advisors are for (other than causing you grief with their agendas). So, if they provide comments via the Wiki doesn't that make a lot of sense. The alternative is emailing around a document. Why is that so different?

In fact, wouldn't it be safer to have it as a Wiki where you could see what each person did? And isn't it the notion of ONLY having your faculty committee / advisors a fairly antiquated notion? After all, the dissertation is certainly much too specific for them to really be experts on the topic. You quickly blow by their knowledge and then you can't get as much help. Opening it up to the world seems to make much more sense.

I've not really paid much attention to this topic. BTW, my experience writing my dissertation was not good. If I could have done it via a combination of blog posts and a wiki, that would have been a completely different experience. And, I truly believe I would have learned more.

I imagine there's lots out there going on around this, I just hadn't thought about it.

Laptop Distraction

A comment just got me a bit worried...

If I were someone not using a laptop during a live conference session, I'd just as soon not sit next to someone who was -- it seems at least for now much more distracting than sitting next to someone taking notes on paper.

As a person who takes all my notes into my laptop (or sometimes into my Treo), it worries me that I could be a laptop distraction as well.

I did a quick search and didn't see a whole lot on this.

• Are other people finding that they are distracted by someone with a laptop sitting next to them at a conference?
• Any suggestions on best way to handle?

May's Mindjet Newsletter Released

This month's Mindjet Newsletter is out and packed with great feature articles by guest columnists: CJ Cornell, Jamie Nast and Stephanie Diamond. You can find a wonderful Tips ‘n Tricks screencast by visual technology specialist Dr. Brian Friedlander, Partner Showcase on BENEfit Sales Maps® for MindManager and Customer Showcase on Judith Glaser and the Creating We Institute. You won't want to miss this one! Also learn about Mindjet's recent acquisition of JCVGantt a great project planning add-in for MindManager 7. You can read a review of JCVGantt that I did earlier this year.

Blog Discussion

Dave Ferguson just raised the issue of blog discussion that has come up before when I talk about Learning and Networking with a Blog. The issue he raises in Mandatory Blogging is:

Here at your own blog, you often have extended discussions. Of the 15 comments here before I started this one, 12 were from 10 people other than yourself. That's a terrific exchange, though I doubt that's the norm. For me to get 15 comments, I have to go back a month, and half those are my own.

Dave points out that given the 90-9-1 Rule he's not likely to get much dialog by creating a blog, posting and waiting for comments. I actually think Dave has a pretty good blog. So, the real question is:

What should a blogger with relatively less traffic do to generate more dialog around topics he's interested in online? Should they try to get more comments? If so, how? Or what else should they do?

I talked about different Types of Blog Discussions before. And Dave is participating in blog carnivals that certainly help. He also has participated in the Learning Circuits Questions. These would be first level suggestions for most bloggers.

Some other things I've seen around this topic or have experienced myself.

1. Comments are Not the Only Blog Discussion

Cross linking and discussion on other blogs is discussion.

2. Ask Questions in Your Posts

Make sure that your posts inspire people to interact. Easiest way is to ask questions.

3. Invite Comments

Make it clear that you'd like discussion. Of course, that's probably same as asking questions.

4. Make Openings Clear

Make it clear that you know that things are missing. For example, I know that the list I'm writing right now is incomplete and there are other things you can/should do.

5. Post Controversial Topics

Take a stand, but something you believe in - not just to be controversial.

What else should bloggers do to create dialog?

ASTD Conference

Anyone going to the ASTD Conference in San Diego in June? It's nice to get together at conferences. If you are going - please drop a comment below.

Even better if you might be interested in blogging about sessions, thoughts, notes, etc. from your experience at the conference. I won't even say it's Mandatory Blogging. :)

Likely this is a better way to have success with networking ahead of the conference (Social Conference Tools - Expect Poor Results). ASTD's site still hasn't provided much value for me. But maybe I'm missing it.

A few other things you might want to look at prior to going to spark ideas...

• Be an Insanely Great Professional Conference Attendee
• Session Hopping a Practical Guide
• Conference Preparation
• Better Questions for Learning Professionals
• Continuing Thoughts on Questions

Oh, I'm doing an eLearning 2.0 Presentation at the ASTD Conference.

Collaborative Note Taking Tools and Methods?

Any suggestions on the best tools and techniques to use for attendees at upcoming sessions to take notes collaboratively? Has anyone done this successfully?

I'm wondering about this both for 75-90 minute presentations and day long courses.

Mandatory Blogging?

Over the past two years, my thoughts around blogging as a learning and networking tool have been slowly evolving.

In Oct 2007, the LCB asked - Should All Learning Professionals Be Blogging? I summarized the responses in: Top Ten Reasons To Blog and Top Ten Not to Blog

At the time, while I felt that blogging was something good to do, I didn't push all that hard. But, slowly I started pointing to:

• Learning and Networking with a Blog (Deleted Scenes)
• Blogging - I'm Pushing Harder Now

Now I'm starting to feel that blogging is such a powerful learning tool that if I was going to send an employee to a conference, I'd want them to use a blog to enhance their learning. If they were starting on some new learning activity, I'd want them to blog.

Certainly in a few cases (formal learning), I've seen blogs be mandated as part of a course. But, otherwise, I've not seen anyone making it mandatory. I'm also thinking that a conference could be a significantly better experience if blogging was essentially mandatory as part of the conference. See Reframing Conference Social Tool Participation and think about the experience if people were blogging and we used an aggregator - ideally pre and post conference as well.

Has anyone else felt this transition from blogging as a nice thing for a few people to something that you want to find ways to force on people?

And Stephen, before you complain about the words force and mandatory, understand that this already happens in classroom settings. I'm extending that same notion to other settings. But I recognize that few (if any) conference organizers would actually go so far as to make it mandatory for attendees. (Although they might if they really wanted to help attendees learn and network.)

Learning Blog

I often suggest learning blogs (see Learning and Networking With A Blog (T+D article) and Personal Learning Strategies). In other words, blogs are a fantastic tool for Personal Learning. I often suggest during presentations that starting a blog at the beginning of any learning endeavor is a great move. I just saw this:

I have decided to take the plunge into the world of National Teacher Board Certification. I am going to record my thoughts and experiences here as a way to keep myself grounded, to have a record of the process and hopefully so that other educators will find this blog and offer encouragement, help and companionship along the way.

I know this happens all the time, but it's a quick reminder that creating a learning blog is a great move.

Mind2Chart- Project Planning Made Easy!

I had shared with you a couple of weeks ago about a new MindManger Pro 7 add-in called Mind2Chart that adds project planning to your visual maps. I had a chance to use Mind2Chart and find it to be a valuable add-in for those of you that want to take your visual maps to the next level and add project management. Mind2Chart uses the underlying MindManager 7 database to drive the application. In a sense they are one in kind- any changes to MindManager Pro 7 are reflected in Mind2Chart and vice e versa. The changes are immediate and Mind2Chart feels very snappy and fast when working with it. I for one know how wonderful a tool MindManager Pro 7 is when brainstorming and setting up the "what" of projects whereas a Mind2Chart is very adept of doing the "when" portion and providing the group with a Gantt Chart to visually see when deliverables are due and how far along tasks are.

Installing and setting up Mind2Chart was a breeze and once installed you will now notice a new icon on your Home tab called Chart Item. This lets you add items on your MindManager Pro 7 map to Mind2Chart. By doing a select all and then selecting the Chart Item bottom you can add all of your items to your Mind2Chart. To view Mind2Chart you simply click on the Mind2Chart button which is on the View Menu. This splits your MindManager 7 screen and displays your Tasks and Gantt Chart on the bottom of the screen. Any changes that you make in Mind2Chart are automatically updated on your MindManager 7 visual map. Using the Mind2Chart tools you can link tasks and control the dependencies for tasks. You will notice that Mind2Chart keeps the first task item as a Summary item that varies depending on the amount of time that the sub- tasks below take. You have the full complement of dependencies that you can use including: Start to Start, Start to Finish, Finish to Start, and Finish to Finish. To set the dependencies you simply click on two or more tasks and then select from the drop down menu the type of dependency and immediately you will see this relationship show up in the Gantt Chart. You will also notice that your MindManager visual map has a new relationship line with the type of dependency noted on the relationship line. Setting the Start Date is as easy as clicking in the field and selecting the date from the Calendar picker. Now all you need to do is decide how much time the task will take and you are ready to view your Gantt Chart. Using the Resource button on the Mind2Chart application you can easily add the name of resources who will be working on the task. If you prefer you can also add resources within MindManager Pro 7 using the Task Information pane. Once you are done adding Resources and Tasks you can create a Task and Resource Spreadsheet with Excel with a click of the mouse. It is also possible to use the Print Preview command to generate a preview of your Gantt Chart and Tasks.



Overall, I found Mind2Chart to be a very easy and powerful MindManager Pro 7 add-in for project planning. This is an ideal tool for those of you who are not full time project managers but who are using MindManager Pro 7 to orchestrate projects. Its split screen interface makes it very easy to work with when going back and forth within MindManager Pro 7. I have found the Mind2Chart Company to be very responsive to my feedback and they have already added features to Mind2Chart since its initial release. It would be nice if Mind2Chart allowed you to be able to color code your tasks in the Gantt Chart or for that matter to inherit the color from within your MindManager Pro 7 visual map. More importantly, I for one would vote for Mind2Chart to be able to generate the overall cost of the project based on your resource type, cost information and time. With the exception of these issues, Mind2Chart is a powerful project planning tool that continues to impress me. You should be aware that the folks at Mind2Chart are working on some of my recommendations and I hope to be able to report to you soon that the aforementioned recommendations have been implemented within a new release of Mind2Chart. If you are using MindManager Pro 7 to orchestrate projects you will find the Mind2Chart is a little gem to move you towards project planning. Likewise, once you have used MindManager Pro 7 and Mind2Chart to plan your project you can then export it to Microsoft Project to take advantage of its advanced reporting and charting features. You can download a free 14 day trial of Mind2Chart by clicking here. Mind2Chart has a full set of video tutorials on their website for anyone who is interested in taking a look how the application works with MindManager Pro 7.

VZNavigator Traffic Enhanced Version Released

I have been using VZNavigator on my cell phone for the past 2 years and have been very pleased with the service. For those of you who may not be familiar with VZNavigator it is a GPS service that you can subscribe to on the Verizon Wireless network. I have blogged about VZNavigator service earlier this year and was excited to find out that VZNavigator Traffic Enhanced service has just been released. When I went to use VZNavigator just the other day, I was informed that there was an update available to download, which I did. Once I installed the update, VZNavigator Traffic Enhanced was installed. VZNavigator Traffic Enhanced was developed by Networks in Motion and provides complete location based services with traffic alerts which were developed based on historical and real time data. I am very impressed with this update for many reasons. For one, I can now use the 3D perspective which provides a much more fluid and dynamic view of the road. The screen has been redesigned and provides additional information about congestion and delays- showing a bar with the colors green, yellow and red. But more importantly, I can now get real time alerts sent to me that let me know when there is an accident or congestion head. With a click of a button on my cell phone I you can hit the Detour softkey button and be rerouted. The turn by turn audio and new screen design has made this and incredibly feature rich GPS device. VZNavigtor Traffic Enhanced now adds real time weather forecast for your GPS location along with a database of Movies and Events in your GPS area. While I do love my gadgets, I am trying to simply my life and having a powerful and user friendly GPS service like VZNavigator Traffic Enhanced on my phone makes a lot of sense. When I move up to a Blackberry Curve later next week I can then take advantage of the larger screen- now that will be nice!

Here is a list of the additions and features of VZNavigator Traffic Enhanced that I pulled from the Networks in Motions website:

• Traffic Integration – Customers in 75 cities can access routes that are calculated using both historical and real-time reported traffic information. Historical information allows customers to see on average whether the traffic is impacted by traffic lights, heavy traffic or school zones. Incident and flow information tells customers how traffic is flowing and includes details about reported accidents, disabled vehicles and congestion. VZ Navigator′s historical data covers over 750,000 miles of roads in 48 states. The traffic tracking center continually monitors conditions along the customers' routes, sending proactive alerts to drivers about conditions ahead of them on their chosen routes. Detour options allow users to compare estimated times of arrival and conditions before selecting a new route.
• Local Movies and Events– Customers can now search for show times, critics' ratings and other details for movies, concerts, plays, sporting events, and other social events based on the physical location of their phones.
• 3D Perspective View – Enhances navigation by displaying maps from angles customers would see through car windshields, making it easier to visualize turn-by-turn directions.
• Gas Finder – Provides customers with information on the location of gas stations close to their physical locations and even provides gas prices as reported by many gas stations in the area. Once a customer selects a station, VZ Navigator can also provide turn-by-turn directions to the selected gas station.
• Weather – Provides current weather conditions and forecasts based on the physical location of the customer's phone without manually inputting an address.

Twitter Status

My twitter status just changed.

Sue Waters - who I met through the posts: Reframing Conference Social Tool Participatio and Social Conference Tools - Expect Poor Results yesterday walked me through what she had done at a couple of conferences. See her page: mlearn2007 by others and mlearn2007 my notes.

Along the way, she convinced me that Twitter was something that I should stop resisting.

She did this by sending a tweet out that asked how Twitter helped people with their personal learning. She quickly got back:

dmcordell @dswaters Hi, Sue. I'm the only LMS in a rural district. The world is my network with Twitter!

Gregory Thompson @dswaters I use Twitter+YahooTubes+RSS Aggregator and it brings me wonderful content via links every day, a place for inspirational sparks

barbs1 @dswaters love the community of sharing and support for our celebrations frustrations sorrows Huge impact on learning new stuff

onlineteacher @dswaters Twitter is critical app 4 me b/c shared brilliance n human connections brighten everyone's world n I can share n do same (teach)

Sunshinetalia @dswaters because i can stay current with what other educators/ elearning peeps are up too! I get great links to resources & readings 2.

RobynDennis @dswaters Twitter allows us (no matter where we are in the world) to receive *instant* updates on the latest news or topics. Great for PD.

jeffmason @dswaters chat room with hyperlinks, alerts to ongoing conversations and pd opportunities

coyenator @dswaters oops. meant none can keep up individually, together we have a better shot at it

coyenator @dswaters none of us can keep up with emergent change everything individually, strength in numbers willing to share connections, knowledge

tjshay @dswaters Just started Twittering last week, have found countless resources...Websites, videos, etc. Faster than blogs

SarahStewart @dswaters Gives me instant access to group of people to share information & ask for advice

k1v1n @dswaters without twitter I would have never met you. And I learn tons from you.

suzievesper @dswaters - the sharing of collective knowledge and the support of like-minded educators.

Inpi Twitter keeps us in touch with the last discoveries in "webland", gets help for "web-troubles", most of all feeds sense of community

That's interesting both from the content and also from getting a question answered pretty quickly. Not sure how I'll think about using LinkedIn Questions vs. Twitter, but it's still good stuff.

So, I broke down and now am on Twitter: http://twitter.com/tonykarrer

So my current twitter status: I'm still not convinced, but am willing to try.

I Report Bugs - Do You?

I received an email telling me that my blog was having problems (showing code all over the page). I quickly checked and didn't see a problem and sent an email back. The response I received was:

Your blog looks fine now. Sorry for wasting your time.

What a misconception. The person had taken the time to report a possible bug on my site. In my mind they are doing me a huge favor.

Most of the time I report bugs. And this extends beyond the online world. If I'm at a restaurant, I will try to tell the manager about an issue - most of the time not to fix it, just to make them aware. Of course, you always evaluate how easy it is to report the issue. If the manager is not around or there's no contact mechanism on the site, then I don't report it.

Generally, people are appreciative of the bug report. But it's sometimes surprising the response you get. It's almost that you are bothering them. They don't want to hear it. No wonder the person was so sensitive about "wasting my time."

So this made me wonder ... is this the norm? Do you report bugs? How do you decide if you spend the time? And, what's your feeling about how they are treated when you report them?

New ConceptDraw Office Release

FYI- CS Odessa announces the release of ConceptDraw Office which provides an innovative approach to managing and visualizing information within your organization

--------------------------------

PRESS RELEASE

Contact: Olesya Yatsuk
Email: O.Yatsuk@csodessa.com
Phone: +38 (0482) 722 66 14

New ConceptDraw Office Release From CS Odessa Takes an Innovative Approach to Managing and Representing Information Within Organizations

Odessa, Ukraine, May 6, 2008 - CS Odessa announces the upcoming release of ConceptDraw Office, scheduled for general availability in mid-June 2008. The brand new business productivity software suite targeted at assisting knowledge workers and project managers in successfully completing extensive sets of tasks in any businesses of any size. ConceptDraw Office addresses the needs of modern managers in a single software solution by covering all aspects of project management including: creativity, productivity, team management, project planning, information management, tracking, resource allocation, and reporting results to stockholders and executives.

The key innovation behind ConceptDraw Office is that for any particular project scenario there is an appropriate visual representation for the respective information. Sample usage scenarios include brainstorming project ideas using a whiteboard-like view, organizing results into highly informative mind maps, and transforming data into detailed project plans and Gantt charts.

ConceptDraw Office reflects the entire collective CS Odessa expertise in developing leading market business applications, data visualization technologies and project management tools. With CS Odessa's revolutionary InGyre Technology, the business productivity applications ConceptDraw MINDMAP, ConceptDraw PROJECT, and ConceptDraw PRO are securely and seamlessly integrated into a single software solution. Depending on the tasks that need to be resolved at a particular moment, the three different applications within the suite can be used while all project data is kept consistent.

The InGyre Technology introduces the capability to work with a single data file when using CS Odessa's project management tool ConceptDraw PROJECT, along with visual mapping software ConceptDraw MINDMAP. Depending on the tasks that need to be resolved, users can decide which application within the suite is most appropriate to accomplish their needs. Any changes to project data in one application are automatically integrated in the others.

The simple creation of visual documentation reflecting actual work progress is a major task that InGyre Technology supports. It easily assists in the creation of visual dashboards and reports that represent key indicators of work progress from either project files or a set of selected tasks. InGyre Technology enables to transform task outlines into professional looking WBS charts. All these documents are editable with ConceptDraw PRO.

Gregory Zhukov, Chief Executive Officer of CS Odessa states, "Never before has a company integrated three visual software solutions into one suite. We place workplace capability into the hands of knowledge workers. We have broken down many of the barriers of true productivity. ConceptDraw Office is all about accomplishing goals and not accepting technical barriers that exist within many other solutions in the market. We have raised the bar, changed the workplace dynamic, and designed our products to utilize the way people think, work, communicate and most importantly:achieve. It's all about accomplishment rather than workarounds that get in the way of real productivity. ConceptDraw Office is for those who want to do."

For more information about ConceptDraw Office, please visit:
http://www.conceptdraw.com/pg?id=cdo_alfa_press-about

ConceptDraw Office is available for pre-order at the price of $499 USD at:
http://www.conceptdraw.com/pg?id=cdo_alfa_press-preorder

ABOUT CONCEPTDRAW PRODUCTIVITY LINE
The ConceptDraw product line for Macintosh and Windows is comprised of:

• ConceptDraw PRO
  Diagramming and drawing software
• ConceptDraw MINDMAP
  Brainstorming tool that utilizes mind mapping techniques to help organize ideas and tasks
• ConceptDraw PROJECT
  Professional project management software
• ConceptDraw WebWave
  Software for creating professional diagrams and drawings on the stage of website or application prototyping and design, page mocking-up and site-mapping
• ConceptDraw NetDiagrammer
  Network and system design

ABOUT CS ODESSA
Founded in 1993, Computer Systems Odessa (www.conceptdraw.com) supplies cross-platform productivity tools and graphics technologies to professional and corporate users. With headquarters in Odessa, Ukraine and an office in California, USA; CS Odessa sells products internationally through resellers in over 25 countries. The ConceptDraw Productivity Line of products has won numerous awards and is used by hundreds of thousands of people all over the world.

My Livescribe- Sharing Your Paper Replay Notes

When you install the Livescribe Desktop software, setup an account, and link your Pulse Smartpen you automatically get 250MB of space on your My Livescribe account to upload your paper replay files. Once you have uploaded your files you have ability to share them as you wish. You can keep them private, share them with a friend via an email, or publish them for all to see. I wanted to give you an idea of what it is like once you publish your paper replay on your My Livescribe space. The publishing of the files are all done within the Livescribe Desktop software and is very easy to use. Once you have uploaded a paper replay file you decide how you want to share it and in the window you will see a thumbnail representation of your uploaded notes. You can also download the PDF rendering of the page. What is unique about the thumbnail image is that once you click on the play button you can hear the recorded notes. If you like you can also click on the arrow on the right upper corner to enlarge the paper replay file (see screenshot on the left) and turn on the animate ink feature which highlights the text that is synchronized with the recording. This is a pretty cool feature. I tested the Livescribe Pulse Smartpen out with a high school student today to see how it would work for him. One of the really nice features for the students who may use this technology is that they don't need to worry about capturing every word the teachers says-but can just record key points which later they can review. To listen to the paper replay file click here.

Google Docs- Embedding Multi-Size Presentations

It is exciting to see Google Doc's evolve with new features being added all of the time. Google Doc's just added the capability of embedding multi-size presentations into your blog or website. You can also now do a multiple selection of different objects on you screen by holding down the Shift key. Check it out

Geek pins about Mind maps

I received an email today from Stephane who shared with me information about a website Geekpins that he has put together that focuses on mind maps. Stephane has a host of mind maps that are downloadable as a PDF file and is willing to send you the MindManager map file if you would like to add to it. Stephane describes the site like this:

Pins on the web map: mind maps linking sources, ideas and concepts... on topics related to innovation. Look at it as visual cheatsheets. Downloadable files are in PDF. If you are willing to improve one or the other map, we will send you the mmap file.

Let me know what you think- thanks Stephane for sharing your resource!

Make Me Better

Needing help to Make Me Better is a common issue. April 2008's Big Question was What would you like to do better as a Learning Professional?

I appreciated part of Karyn's answer -

"How do you plan to achieve that?" Oh crud, I don't know.

I think this is a common problem. We often define goals and then we struggle with the specific steps to help make me better. One of the beauties of blogging is that you can enlist the support of lots of other people who help you think through things and help make me better.

Take a look at some of the comments in recent posts:

• Reframing Conference Social Tool Participation
• Social Conference Tools - Expect Poor Results
• Blog Learning

I have really appreciated recent help through comments on this blog. There have been a few new commenters who I truly thank for helping to make me better. Thanks.

PersonalBrain 101 Web Classes

If you are just getting started learning how to best use the PersonalBrain then you should consider signing up for the free PersonalBrain Webinar's that are held every Friday. Both Matt and Shelley do a great job of explaining the basics and will quickly get you up to speed on how to best work and design your brain using the PersonalBrain. I have participated in these webinars and have always found them to be very informative and worthwhile. So if you are just getting started using the PersonalBrain then you should consider signing up for the free webinar this Friday. The webinars are every Friday, 10:00 AM Pacific Time / 1:00 Eastern Time

MeadMap License Give Away

I want to thank Omar for being so kind to give me a MeadMap code for my readers. The first 50 users can get a free 6 month subscription to MeadMap. If you haven't yet tried out online mind mapping applications then here is your opportunity at no risk. So go to MeadMap and use the code: ASTECH01