General

The brrreeeport report

http://scobleizer.wordpress.com/2006/02/13/the-brrreeeport-report/ How do the blog search engines compare for accuracy and timeliness? This unscientific test aims to reveal the differences.

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EdTechUK: e-Portfolio roundup

http://fraser.typepad.com/edtechuk/2006/02/eportfolio_roun.html "The only product I'd currently recommend is the excellent Elgg ... suitable for use with all ages of learners which has a ton of unique and innovative features." High praise. Thanks, Josie!

General

Mix 06: cynically monetising the web

I've got to admit to being a bit uneasy about Microsoft's upcoming conference in Las Vegas, Mix '06. Maybe it's the chummy way the website proclaims it's a "72 hour conversation". Maybe it's the friendly but oh-

General

Linkology - How the Most-Linked-To Blogs Relate

http://www.nymag.com/news/media/15972/ An interesting graph of how the 50 most popular weblogs out in the wild link to each other. Looking at this, one gets the feeling that a side effect of web-based social networking is cliques. How can we avoid it? How does

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Campfire

http://www.campfirenow.com/ "Easy group chat for business has arrived." Not just for business, I'd wager. I've set up a test chat room to try it out: http://benwerd.campfirenow.com/room/2905

General

Importing external content into your blog

This is all a bit experimental, but I've just asked Elgg to post any new items from my del.icio.us feed with the keyword "linklog" to my main blog. When the RSS gets grabbed later on tonight, you should see a link to Wired News.

General

The perils of text-based communication

http://www.wired.com/news/technology/0,70179-0.html "Those who sent the messages predicted that nearly 80 percent of the time their partners would correctly interpret the tone. In fact the recipients got it right just over 50 percent of the time."

General

Open GUI library

Yahoo have released their user interface library free under the open source BSD license. Their bid to become darlings of the blogger set continues apace.

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Speak for free

Goodbye Skype, it was nice knowing you: the eBay-owned Voice over IP firm has agreed to cripple their software on non-Intel machines. If you log in with a PC based on an AMD chip, as many are, the number of people you can conference with is halved, for

General

Using your resource tab

The resource tab is one of the most powerful features in Elgg. Each resource is a feed of information from either within Elgg or elsewhere on the web, which you can view on its own or together on an aggregated page that looks a bit like a weblog. How does

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Embedded chat

3Bubbles - another daffy Web 2.0 name - is a way to embed chat rooms in blog posts, using a small piece of code. The interface itself is AJAX-based, so you don't need any extra plugins; just the browser It's in closed beta at the moment,

General

Ubiquitous computing

I'm writing this on the 5.32 oxford to london. Literally half the carriage - including me - is glued to their mobile phone. They're communicating, but at the same time sitting in a kind of eery silence. Is technology destroying our sense of community? Or is it