Knowledgewebb is a site offering hands-on training, self-directed courses, ongoing webinars and more for everyone working in media and communications. Members receive unlimited hands-on training in a very easy-to-use setting, interactive live webinars and chat sessions and access to experts in a dozen different subject areas. We even have a database of 125+ hands-on lessons to help you learn more. (And we're adding new lessons every week!) Want to start your own website from scratch? We have a lesson for that. (Six, actually - showing you how to pick a domain, how to choose a platform, how to get your content online, etc.) Want to use Twitter to market yourself? Yes, we have a lesson for that, too. Flash for beginners? Check. Buying a digital camera? Yep. Facebook Connect? Of course! Take a look at our current offerings here.
And if you wanted to know about getting content to mobile phones, or selecting a content management system, starting a website from scratch or even how to protect your identity while researching online, you can ask one of our Experts directly for help. I wanted to give you the same kind of access I have to the leading movers and shakers in digital media. Need to learn more about visual storytelling? Ask our Expert, Emmy-award winning journalist Tom Kennedy. Just getting started? Amy Eisman, nationally-known writing and teaching coach and American University Professor, is here to help. Want some feedback on your Flash project? Mark Luckie, author of the popular 10000 Words blog and award-winning multimedia designer, will critique your work. Longtime NPR personality and trainer Doug Mitchell is ready to help with all your audio questions... Our Expert list goes on and on.
What is Knowledgewebb?
Knowledgewebb offers hands-on training, self-directed courses, ongoing webinars and more for everyone working in media and communications. Want to learn Wordpress to start your first blog? Ready to try your first audio-photo slideshow? Need a refresher on CSS? Or are you just a beginner who doesn't really know where to start? We created Knowledgewebb for people working in all ares of media who are trying to reinvent themselves and either reinvigorate - or save, as the case has become - their careers.
Membership has its benefits! Unlimited hands-on training in a very easy-to-use setting. Interactive live webinars and chat sessions. Access to experts in 20 different subject areas. And much more:
• More than 120 self-directed lessons so far, with 3-5 new lessons added each week. Topics range from “How to hire a developer” to “Semantic Web basics,” and “How to launch your first blog” to “Building an iPhone app from scratch.”
• More than a dozen recognized experts in a variety of topic areas, including Mobile, Flash, Location Aware Services, Semantic Web and even Beginner. You'll get direct access to each and every one of them!
• Interviews with the creators of popular Web applications and tools, with explanations of how they can be adopted for use in journalism, PR and communications.
• Several expert-peer Smart Rooms, where our members can ask targeted questions about a wide range of topics and get immediate answers from our experts and knowledge community.
• Worksheets and step-by-step primers for those starting a new communications business, publication, blog and more.
• Dozens of how-to guides and tipsheets.
• Archives with transcripts of past live webinars and live chats.
• A schedule of upcoming live chats with experts and webinars, which are free for all members to attend.
What people are saying...
"You tell folks the WHY, which is perhaps the most important piece that we miss in multimedia training. We show them shiny objects, scare them to death and tell them if they don't use them they'll loose their job. Knowledgewebb shows you the truth by showing your the tools byt then giving you the context about when to use them and why it can be useful." - Cory Haik, Director of Content at The Seattle Times, Seattle, Washington.
"Busy executives don't have time to follow all of the trends in media, and hardly any have the expertise to identify the trends worth watching. Knowledgewebb helps you know not only what's worth watching, but how to implement technology in your business. -Ken Sands, Executive Editor, Congressional Quarterly, Washington, D.C.
"As someone who's trying to start a website, I've found Knowledgewebb to be invaluable. After just a few weeks taking self-directed lessons and sitting in on some of the Live Chats, I feel like I have the basic information I need to start my business. I haven't found anywhere else online with this much information!" - Edgar Lewis, Entrepreneur, Greensboro, North Carolina.
I'd love to hear from you, too! Please email me and let me know what you think... feedback, ideas, etc. welcome!
]]>Knowledgewebb is a site offering hands-on training, self-directed courses, ongoing webinars and more for everyone working in media and communications. It gives direct access to the creators of popular Web applications and tools, mobile applications/ handsets and other tech gadgets via targeted live chat sessions and discussion forums, which we're calling "Smart Rooms." Knowledgewebb also publishes regular short interviews with leading developers about tech trends and how they apply to journalism, public relations and beyond.
Members receive unlimited hands-on training in a very easy-to-use setting, interactive live webinars and chat sessions and access to experts in a dozen different subject areas...so far. If you wanted to about getting content to mobile phones, or selecting a content management system, starting a website from scratch or even how to protect your identity while researching online, you can ask one of our Experts directly for help. We have a database of 100+ hands-on lessons to help you learn more. Everything has been written and programmed specifically for content producers, be they journalists, mommy bloggers, university public relations or even the head of a major broadcast network.
Let me know what you think!
]]>Here's what I know you don't want to hear: Many of you probably won't land back on your feet as a working journalist at an American newspaper.
So we're going to reprise our free training, that we offered to laid-off Gannett folks in December and January, and open it up to all the journalists who lost their jobs in Colorado, in Seattle and elsewhere. About half of what my company (Webbmedia Group) does is training. We train reporters, editors, producers, developers, teachers...hell, we even train lots of trainers...on how to adapt technology for journalism. (The other half is strategic planning and innovation. Like, which content management system should you use and how can you best implement it to accommodate mobile, the geospatial web, etc?)
So, to the recently laid-off journalists, here's something to help: We're going to offer an updated version of our free training session on what to do next. It will focus on emerging technology and post-mainstream journalism careers. We'll show you some new tech trends, explain how you can combine them with what you already know, and then show you how to apply your skillset to either land a new gig or even start your own site. As before, this won't be an hour of learning code - it'll be instruction on how to think and understand differently.
Again, these sessions are free. You'll also get access to tipsheets and other information. Criteria are below:
WHO: We'd prefer that you're a newspaper refugee, but we won't turn away working journalists or anyone working in communications. Sorry - this time, we will not take technologists, consultants, academics or students. We're going to check, so don't try to pull a fast one on us.
WHEN: Wednesday, March 25th at 3pm Eastern Time. The training session will last 75 minutes.
HOW/ WHERE: We'll give registrants a call-in number and passcode ahead of the session. You'll need a computer (one that's online, of course) and a phone line to call into. After the session, we'll give you access to tipsheets and other information to help you continue learning on your own.
HOW TO REGISTER: Send an email message with your full name, your email address and where you're currently (or were recently) employed. Also tell us what kind of job you had (multimedia producer, city hall reporter for the paper, etc). For those of you who have previously participated in one of our training sessions, you'll already know that we never do the same thing twice and that all of our sessions are completely personalized. To the extent we can, we're going to try and do the same thing this time around - so share whatever information you'd like. The more we get, the more meaningful we can make the information for you. DEADLINE FOR REGISTRATION IS MARCH 20th. NO EXCEPTIONS.
I'd like to cap the session at 200 people total, so this will be first-come, first-served. While I'd prefer that you didn't participate in one of the previous sessions, this one will be different, so it's okay for you to register again.
There are no strings attached, folks. We're just trying to help out. Please help spread the word!
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And for a limited time, you can also download our glossary translated into Russian here.
More to come! Meantime, we're hard at work on a stealthy project launching this April... stay tuned!]]>
You can make a neat, automatically updated mosaic of the folks following your on Twitter. Take a look at Sxoop to get your own mosaic and to order pretty cool Twitter swag.
I've since taken mine down - the more followers you have, the longer it takes to load...
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My excuse? I've been hopping around various cities working...and we have a project over at Webbmedia Group cooking in the background that's been taking up a lot of my time. Look for an April launch!
One other thing we've been working on is translating our knowledge base - dozens and dozens of guides, how-to tipsheets, self-guided lessons and more - into multiple languages. Pretty soon, we'll have glossaries and tipsheets written for anyone working in communications translated into Russian, Arabic, Hindi and, of course, Spanish. (As an aside, we're still trying to find a French translator - pls email me if that's you!) Some of the work is currently available in the Public Research Center on the Webbmedia site.
Since we're in the process of putting together all of these resources, I'd love your feedback! Are there specific how-to guides or tipsheets you wish you had? Please let us know via email (info at webbmediagroup dot com) or Twitter!
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<Laugh>
(Can't find where these originated, and I'd like to include a link to the artists.)
<Help>
We're making the self-assessment worksheet and other materials from our "Now What?!" webinars available for everyone to use. Click here to see a list and download.
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It's a great day indeed!
The answer is no. There is a growing body of anecdotal evidence showing that true social mavens are not those with massive networks, but are instead the folks who actively produce great content that is forwarded and reposted via their connections (and their connections) across other networks. S/he may not have thousands of followers, but it doesn’t matter. A person in this position is eventually seen as a digital sage. Posts and updates will spread virally throughout global social networks even if 10,000 people aren’t connected to him/her.
At Webbmedia Group, we define socialitics as the the act of analyzing a person’s or message’s scope throughout social networks, in an attempt to discover its true reach and impact. To be sure, many people use the term “engagement” to describe in general how engaged your site’s visitors are with your content. (Are they clicking on your links? Are they staying on your site to read?). Socialitics is instead a measurement of what’s happening throughout the vast number of social networks on the web.
What is your company website/ mobile tool’s socialitics?
It’s important to monitor traffic, to determine how and where visitors are finding your content, how much time they spend with it, and what they’re clicking on. You advertisers (or funders/ investors) will want this data - and you’ll need to know about how you fare within your own competitive landscape.
But standard analytic tools, such as Omniture SiteCatalyst, Tacoda and Google Analytics, aren’t able to capture data on the discussion about your site (or you, personally), references to content that’s been posted or even instances of your content that has been reposted elsewhere.
What’s your personal social network’s socialitic score?
Let’s say that you now have 27,000 Twitter followers and that you typically post 20 tweets on an average day. Doing simple math, that means your message is heard 540,000 times every single day - and that would just be within your own personal network.
The problem is that the numbers don’t really add up quite so nicely. While there is no concrete, official data released from any of the social networks, those who study them agree that only 20-40% of uses participate - that means post and read posts - with any regularity.
A recent study by Bernardo Huberman, Daniel Romero and Fang Wu, researchers at Hewlett-Packard’s Social Computing Lab, looked at 309,740 Twitter users who had an average of 255 posts (in total), 85 followers and followed 80 other users. Of the 309,740 users, 32% posted only one time and then didn’t use the service again.
Rather than counting friends or followers, a more accurate representation of reach is to follow reposts, retweets and mentions of your content across other social networks.
Your socialitic score, therefore, measures how effective you are at contributing to conversations and compelled others to share your wisdom/ questions/ content.
We have just createad a new tipsheet to help you determine how powerful you/ your message/ your company is online. We offer a checklist and lots of websites to get you started. Download the tipsheet here.
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Dear New Yorker/ Condé Nast Advertising Team:
Got your email (again) today. Sorry, I was in meetings with some of our clients - just getting to your message now.
I'm starting to question our relationship. Yesterday, you insisted that I purchase a BlackBerry Storm when you know I have a relatively new iPhone 3G. I thought we were on the same page. I mean, you seemed to think it was pretty neat when Lizzie Widdicombe talked to that guy who tried to publish a magazine using his iPhone. I thought the iPhone was "cool." But I guess you've moved on.
Today in your message, I think you're accusing me of being, well, a little fashion-backward. You urged me to "be a well-dressed rebel with GQ rules." But have you seen my hair?! It just doesn't get more rebellious than this. In fact, I already use a cocktail of four products in the morning to tame my curls and frizz. That's after shampooing and conditioning with this really fancy stuff I import from France. (And we all know that they're rebellious!)
Quite frankly, I'm a bit concerned about what you might suggest I do next. I mean, what else is wrong with me? Do you think I made the wrong computer purchase? Am I looking fat? Do I need certain...enhancements?
I'm starting to question our relationship. I used to look forward to your once-a-week wit and charm. Now, it just feels like you're harassing me day in, day out.
Anyhoo - I guess I'll look forward to hearing back from you tomorrow afternoon sometime. Unless we're fighting or something. Is it the way I dress? I feel like you want me to leave the "in" group. Are you mad at me? I'm really worried.
XOXO,
Amy
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