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Posts from — July 2008

How to use video communications with volunteers

by Miraz

Jayne Cravens and Coyote Communications have information, links and explanations about using video in community organisations:

Video is a great way to further support your volunteers, and your computer probably already has all of the tools you need to make a video, or to engage in a live video conversation with others. The majority of computers sold today come with built in microphones and cameras, as well as the software you need to make a video — and even older computers can view most video platforms. In addition, older computers can also run a lot of live event software, such as iVisit, allowing for live video streaming and two-way video conversations.

Video isn’t something to use only with online volunteers or remote volunteers (those providing onsite service at a different location than yours). It’s also a tool you can use with new and current volunteers. And, in addition to an organization producing videos for volunteers, it can also work the other way around: volunteers can produce videos for organizations.

[Via : Using Video Communications With Volunteers.]

There’s a lot of information there, so set aside an hour or two. Also be sure to watch Jayne’s YouTube video.

This post suggested by Ted Zorn.

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July 31, 2008   No Comments

The next 5,000 days of the web

by Miraz

While the Internet has been around for decades, the web is only around 15 years old.

A decade ago anyone suggesting that we’d all have instant access to vast stores of information, or satellite images of the planet, or near real-time photos from an event half a world away, for free, from a device we hold easily in one hand would have been thought a wild dreamer. Today it’s just reality.

We use laptop computers, large and tiny, cellphones, games machines, home computers, to connect to the Internet, sharing text, sounds and images instantly with billions of others.

All that in 15 years. But what’s next? What will we be doing in another 15 years? People often talk about what may happen next year, or even, at a stretch, the year after that, but Kevin Kelly stretches his mind , and ours, with a longer view:

At the 2007 EG conference, Kevin Kelly shares a fun stat: The World Wide Web, as we know it, is only 5,000 days old. Now, Kelly asks, how can we predict what’s coming in the next 5,000 days?

Download his 20 minute talk from Kevin Kelly on the next 5,000 days of the web | Video on TED.com to find out what he sees in our future. The talk is around 70Mb, so you need broadband.

He offers interesting, and challenging, ideas. What do you think of what he suggests?

July 31, 2008   No Comments

Make Your Public Event Calendar Usable To All

by Mike Riversdale

If you run a sports club, this post is for you.
If you are on a community committee, this post is also for you
If you host events, this is for you.
If you put on shows, this is for you.

In fact, if you do anything that has a date/time component that you’d like to share with people, this is for you. Yep, probably for all of us.

Sharing calendars can be both:

  • an effective way of letting everyone know
  • a complete and utter technical pain in the bottomly region

If you’ve posted up an events page onto your website you know how difficult it is to keep up to date, how the readers have to keep coming back to get the latest changes and don’t even think about integrating with somebody else’s “events page”.

Ok, so we all know the problem.
What’s the solution? iCalendar (normally shortened to iCal) … yep, it’s a geek word that you will come to know and love just as much as RSS. In fact, think of it as RSS for calendars. But that’s enough geekery, if you want to know more pop over to Wikipedia: iCalendar

All we need to know is that iCal is the Web way of sharing calendars.
And with everyone being on the Web why not make your sporting club calendar available on the Web? “Because it sounds hard Mike, that’s why!”

Allow Google Calendar to be your friend.
Google Calendar is not just a calendaring system for you, the singular, even though it does that very well. It also allows you to:

  • Set-up group calendars
  • Share and collaborate on calendars
  • Publish them on the Web

And it’s the last bit I want to draw your attention to today.
Publishing your calendar on the Web means that anyone can “subscribe” to your calendar and all updates you make are instantly reflected in their calendar client. And it’s not just about dates and times but also locations, maps, details and even links to web pages.

Take a look at this example from the publicly available Wellingtonista Event Calendar (iCal)

Everything you need to know without ever having to do a thing.

Set-up a public Google Calendar

  1. Get yourself a Google Account
  2. Go to your Google Calendar (http://calendar.google.com)
  3. Click the ‘Manage calendars’ link - bottom left of the current calendar list (which might only be one, yours)
  4. At the bottom of the “My calendars” list click the the ‘Create new calendar’ button
  5. Fill in the new calendar details including:
    • A clear name (I include a location that the calendar covers such as “Wellington, New Zealand”)
    • Verbose and clear description
    • Who, if anyone, you’d like to be able to update the calendar

  6. Ensure the “Make this calendar public” is ticked

    Note: you can change this later or for specific events
  7. Push the “Create Calendar” button
  8. Start adding your events

Share your newly created public calendar
Google will index your calendar within 24 hours allowing it to be searched by everyone.

However there are many other ways to share your calendar and, because it uses the Web standard iCal, they don’t have to use Google Calendar (but why wouldn’t you!) as long as their calendaring system understands iCal you’re sorted.

And for the uber geeks and/or IT Departments you can build calendars on your own website using Google Calendar Data API

One final goodie, notifications.
You can have events pop-up, email you or even send a txt to your mobile … you never have to miss an event ever again!

Add a public calendar to your Google Calendar

  1. Go to your Google Calendar (http://calendar.google.com)
  2. Click the ‘Manage calendars’ link - bottom left of the current calendar list (which might only be one, yours)
  3. Click the ‘Add calendar’ button - bottom of the list of current “Other calendars”
  4. Make sure you’re in the “Search Public Calendars” tab
  5. Search for your calendar (eg, wellingtonista) and push the ‘Search’ button
  6. There it is - click the ‘Add Calendar’ button

A sample of public calendars
Finally, the goodies we’ve all been waiting for, a sample list of publicly available calendars you can subscribe to right now by either doing a search inside your Google Calendar or by browsing the Google Calendar Directory. If you publish a public calendar for your events let me know and I’ll tell the world for you.

New Zealand
978 calendars matched my search, here’s a sample:

Australia
A total of 457 matched my calendar search with the following a mere taste:

UK
Too many to contemplate, you’re gonna have to really be specific to the events you want :-)

The rest of the world
I went looking for the strangest calendars I could find and the three I present to you are:

More resources
There’s LOTS about Google Calendar on the Web, here’s some pre-loaded searches for you:

(this is a cross posting from MiramarMike.co.nz)

July 28, 2008   1 Comment

Grassroots action - the movie

by Miraz

The US Burning the Future campaign and movie is about the grassroots actions of ordinary people who want their locale, state and country to move away from burning coal and towards clean energy:

In Burning the Future: Coal in America, writer/director David Novack examines the explosive forces that have set in motion a groundswell of conflict between the coal industry and residents of West Virginia. Confronted by an emerging coal-based US energy policy, local activists watch the nation praise coal without regard to the devastation caused by its extraction. Faced with toxic ground water, the obliteration of 1.4 million acres of mountains, and a government that appeases industry, our heroes demonstrate a strength of purpose and character in their improbable fight to arouse the nation’s help in protecting their mountains, saving their families, and preserving their way of life.

They have a blog, a movie available for purchase. And I know about this because I subscribe to the Life on Terra podcasts where there are several trailers for the movie.

The trailer that particularly caught my interest is the 9 minute (74 Mb) TERRA 437: Democracy and Action from Burning the Future: Coal in America, which talks a lot about collective action, social responsibility, civil society, and the power each of us has to create change.

If you have a broadband connection I suggest you download this movie trailer, watch how the group is getting its message across, and consider what lessons there may be for your organisation.

We’d also love for you to leave some comments below: did you watch it? What did you think? How can seeing this movie trailer make a difference to your work?

July 26, 2008   No Comments

Use software in Maori

by Miraz

As an English-speaking Kiwi I don’t very often have problems with or objections to using software in English. I do have problems though when I’m told my New Zealand spelling is incorrect or that a place name such as Porirua is wrong.

Karaitiana Taiuru is doing his bit for speakers of Māori by contributing translations where he can:

On Thursday i begun translating or localizing Skype into Maori.

This will join other popular software that is available or will currently be available in Maori language including:

  • Google is now in Maori language - awaiting Google approval.
  • Windows XP, Office XP
  • Moodle and many others.

[Via Karaitiana Taiuru - Blog: Skype Maori.]

If you have comments or queries about Māori translations visit Karaitiana’s blog and contact him there. Even better: perhaps you can contribute some translations yourself.

And if neither Māori nor English is your language of choice then look around for the languages you need, and offer your skills for translations.

July 26, 2008   1 Comment

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