5 ways journalists can use private social networks
June 24, 2014 by Catalina Albeanu - posted on NewsRewired.com

Private social media, one of the digital trends journalists should follow this year, has emerged as a new way of connecting with the audience and an opportunity to pull in more readers, viewers and listeners.

We’ve put together a list of five ways journalists have been using private social networks recently to show what can be done.

Read Full Article here:

http://www.newsrewired.com/2014/06/27/5-ways-journalists-can-use-private-social-networks/

Sent from my iPad
Randall McCallum
ChamberAnswers.com

This article provides some very good information about private social network communities in education. When more people interested in creating their own education related social networks find out about EasySocial, we will start to see an increase in these education networks.

Indiana Tries Online Teacher Communities to Help With Shift From Common Core
By Benjamin Herold on June 29, 2014 6:45 PM - posted on Edweek.org

The Indiana state education department recently launched dozens of new online teacher communities, part of a mad scramble to help educators transition to new academic standards that will take effect in September, just six months after the Hoosier state became the first in the nation to ditch the Common Core.

"It's been a wild ride," said Candice Dodson, the state department's assistant director of e-learning, during remarks made at the annual conference of the International Society for Technology in Education, being held here this weekend.

While the timeline for switching standards has undoubtedly been "hectic," Dodson told Education Week in an interview following the panel discussion in which she took part, the transition has also brought together a wide range of state education officials in an "all hands on deck" effort to make life easier for teachers. The state deparment'sOffice of eLearning has been integral to that effort, Dodson said, creating 52 new virtual "communities of practice" intended to help educators share resources and discuss common questions. Within two weeks, more than 1,000 teachers have signed up, she said.

Read Full Article here:

http://blogs.edweek.org/edweek/DigitalEducation/2014/06/indiana_tries_online_teacher_c.html

Sent from my iPad
Randall McCallum
ChamberAnswers.com

Thanks for sharing this Randall How have you been? Is everything okay there with your arms?

Hi Randall

Thanks for the the links. I read them all with great interest. If I knew stuff like this I would post it but I do not. I look forward to seeing your Site some day soon...

best

Paul

Mark wrote:

Thanks for sharing this Randall How have you been? Is everything okay there with your arms?

Thanks for asking Mark,

My right (dominant arm) is healing better than expected by my doctor after a tumble on my new rollerblades in late April. I can type again and use the mouse with my right hand as of a few days ago. The three breaks in the upper right shoulder were pinned together with 2 titanium plates and 12 titanium screws in a 5 1 /2 hour operation. I look back at the photos and I am so happy I don't have to go through all that pain now. The breaks were painful, but the torn bicep, upper shoulder and chest muscles that we're torn badly are slower to mend. The bruising was massive, and the blood clots kept coming back for over a month. I have an Olympic Team doctor treating me and I am well looked after. I lucked out and got the best doctor for my injury that I possibly could. So I feel fortunate.

It took one small pebble to bring me crashing down. The universe sent me a message to slow down a little. I have been feeling real good and have been walking the hiking trails these past few weeks, and I have been thinking lots about ES 1.3 and EB 4 and I'm looking forward to getting things back on track in anticipation of the betas.

Of course I am selling the rollerblades and decided there will be no more extreme hiking in my future. I skated for the past 54 years and that's half a century and I promised Elaine that that's enough. Time to keep my feet flat on the ground and get more involved with low impact water sports. I do like that synchronized swimming and ladies water ballet. I watched more TV and Youtube videos in the past two months than in the past 10 years combined. Ha ha.

I have been following all the message threads very closely and I'm looking forward to your blog post when you make the highly anticipated information about EasyBlog 4 available.

Paul Murray wrote:

Hi Randall

Thanks for the the links. I read them all with great interest. If I knew stuff like this I would post it but I do not. I look forward to seeing your Site some day soon...

best

Paul

You're welcome Paul,

I have had lots of available time lately while I'm healing from my tumble in late April and I set up the Zite iPad app to gather the most interesting articles in categories I'm most interested. now that my arm is healing and I can type again I am getting more involved again. My site release was set back a few months, but I've always followed my belief that things happen for good reasons.

The anticipation of ES1.3 and EB 4 is very exciting, and like anyone, I'm sure looking forward to the blog updates, and to dig in and start beta testing when they become available.

I saw that TechJoomla posted an update about their Shika LMS and they expect a beta release in later July. I'm looking forward to it, as I'm sure you are.

Hi Randall

I fought the pebble and the pebble won. Yeah I hear you loud and clear but it sounds as if you have a positive spin on this though and that is what counts :-) Welcome back to the forum

Yeah I can not wait for the Techjoomla LMS.

In the meantime I have been playing with some other stuff and thinking about what could make an LMS even better?!?

Two things I am toying with:

http://techjoomla.com/products/broadcast

The reason I am interested in this is because apart from automated posting to FB & Co. I am hoping that people who create courses can also use it to push to their own Social media FB & Co for course promotion etc.

Am finding Techjoomla some how very competent but in a really geeky kind of way! A little grumpy and some prodding required Stackideas really have set the bar for support!

Another thing that I looked at that really blew mind mind was/is

http://www.tigracon.com/tigra-circles

I can imagine it being very powerful for building study groups/circles of Subject matters, Circles of teachers and much more…

Still have to get my head around a lot of stuff. But if it were easy it would be boring! And then packing much of the above into an App. The madness!!! Like even a year ago something like this would have been kind of unthinkable without an army of people working for you or a degree in App design!!! The possibilities really seem to be limitless….

Exciting times. Wishing you a healthy recovery (not speedy recovery) it is so important to take the time to heal

best

Paul

Yes Paul, I learned a long time ago to turn a negative into a positive. It is said that when we do something, there are consequences.

Quoted from Paul's reply:
I fought the pebble and the pebble won.

Disclaimer:
This article and the photo attached below are not for the faint of heart. The photo attachment below (Since removed I removed it because even though it shows what can happen in an instant, the photo may be too graphic for some viewers) may be gruesome to some viewers.

The tumeric tea is a serious tea blend drink that can cause issues with some people. Check your medication before drinking any tumeric tea.

Just as ripples spread out when a single pebble is dropped into water, the actions of individuals can have far-reaching effects. - Dalai Lama

I like this quote a lot.

My meeting with the pebble that day was based on an action that has had far reaching consequences for me. These consequences spread like the ripples from a small stone dropped into water. We never know what these ripples will do. That day was a fork in the road for me. I remember my day so well. I just finished installing a new version of EasySocial and I made the decision to go rollerblading at the last minute. I had planned to do more on my site, but exercise is important to me.

I strapped on the new rollerblades and skated past a soccer field, and down the lane, I was unable to chose between taking one path or the other, and it took this one time event for something to happen. The small pebble made me select one option over the other. I had been hit by a ripple from a stone dropped by another. And my actions caused ripples and they had an impact on those around me, and many other people I briefly met. If you believe in philosophy, these are the far-reaching consequences. Something I did may be related to a friend or someone I met, who relates it to another, and pretty soon, the ripples are on another continent. I believe they are beneficial ripples.

I am not much for taking pain killers such as Tylenol 3s with Codine, as they have consequences on the body circulatory system, so I researched natural pain killers and found that Tumeric spice is an amazing natural anti-inflammatory with so many benefits. I started drinking a green tea that has been so beneficial to curbing the inflammation in my right side of my upper body. See the ugly photo below. Inflammation at it's worst, settled down by this amazing health benefit tea blend.



Anti-Inflammatory Turmeric & Ginger Tea

- 1 tea bag
- 1/4 teaspoon of tumeric spice (curcumin is the active ingredient)
- 1/4 teaspoon cinnamon spice (an ani-inflammatory)
- 1/4 teaspoon of ginger spice (an ani-inflammatory)
- a bit of coconut milk (required fat)
- 3 pepper corns and a sprinkle of black pepper - required for the curcumin to get absorbed properly into the blood stream.
Turmeric needs to be combined with fat in order for the body to make use of its anti-inflammatory properties. Add some delicious coconut milk to get the required fat. It's very healthy for you.
- Honey - You can add honey to make it taste better.

Note! Watch the mixing of the tumeric. The tumeric stains things yellow.

Add boiling hot water in large tea cup. Let the ingredients steep for 10 minutes then drink hot to warm. It acts quickly (within 15 minutes) and it takes down the inflammation for hours, allowing me to sleep or do things throughout the day mostly pain free.

Turmeric is high in curcumin, a substance with powerful anti-inflammatory and antioxidant properties. Most studies used turmeric extracts that are standardized to include large amounts of curcumin. - AuthorityNutrition.com

Good article on the benefits of Anti-Inflammatory Turmeric & Ginger Tea from AuthorityNutrition.com:

http://authoritynutrition.com/top-10-evidence-based-health-benefits-of-turmeric/

Curcumin leads to several changes on the molecular level that may help prevent and perhaps even treat cancer. - AuthorityNutrition.com

I told my friends and family about this amazing tumeric tea, and all my friends drink it daily now. One friend hadn't slept in years because of having to get up ten times a night. Older men's issues. Since drinking the Tumeric tea on a daily basis, he says he sleeps 7 hours every night uninterrupted. The tumeric tea is one of the best anti-inflammatories you can take. It's even used in cancer treatment.

My doctor asked me what I was using for an anti-inflammatory on my last checkup, as he says every other patient wants more pain killers. I told him about how my accident had brought about my research into the best natural anti-inflammatory rather than take Tylenoyl 3s for pain and I told him about the tumeric green tea. He wrote down the recipe, and he is going to recommend it in his treatment of patients.

The more I learn about natural healing, the more I feel that Easyocial and EasyBlog is an excellent platform for sharing knowledge. I lkearned a lot from another member of this community. Sean Carney and his wife Linda have a few health related sites that are based on StackIdeas extensions, and Sean and his wife are a bundle of knowledge when it comes to health.

I see more and more potential for StackIdeas solutions being used by the new wave of health care providers. I can imagine the day when EasySocial allows for integration with Apple's healthkit solutions.

From Apple.com:
The new Health app gives you an easy-to-read dashboard of your health and fitness data. And we’ve created a new tool for developers called HealthKit, which allows all the incredible health and fitness apps to work together, and work harder, for you. It just might be the beginning of a health revolution.

Tumeric Tea is also great mood lifter. I found my mood was lifted after drinking the tea and in my research there are so many benefits to curcumin in tumeric.

A study in 60 depressed patients showed that curcumin was as effective as prozac in alleviating the symptoms of depression. - AuthorityNutrition.com

Today, I am a much happier healthier person, and I am mostly pain free, and appreciate each day more and more.

Here is another great article on the benefits of Tumeric Tea. The author also has her own recipe posted in the article.

http://www.meghantelpner.com/blog/tea-time-with-turmeric/

My involvement in this community is very important to me. The time away from everyday participation was very beneficial. I read and followed every thread intently, but could not participate much. I learned so much from so many people over the past few months. My curiosity of what people are building with EasySocial and other StackIdeas extensions is at an all time high. It would be great to see a thread specific to sites created with EasySocial and EasyBlog.

I look forward to seeing your site one day soon. And I agree there is so much that we can do now with the tools we get to use that are created by very talented people. We all learn from each other, and that's what makes this forum such a great learning experience community.

Today, I noticed my typing is near back to my previous levels. But I know when to take walks so I don't sit to long. It's 5:56 am and I am at my niece's place for my great nephew's first birthday celebration today. Soon he will be teaching me things on the computer and ipad. He loves to click around on my iPad to make music.

Have a wonderful weekend.

NOTE: the photo below is not for the faint of heart. This happened stepping off a street curb. A small pebble caused me to fall on my rollerblades. The damage done was extensive. Never thought something so small as a pebble could cause something so painful.

At first, I thought, "Why didn't I stay working on my site?" but things hpen for a reason. My injury may have set me back a bit in the timing of my site, but the last few months recovery had so many unforeseen consequences that have been beneficial. That's why I believe in Turning a negative into a positive.

Oh man Randall could you not put a warning on that! It really is not for the faint hearted. Yikes

Paul Murray wrote:

Oh man Randall could you not put a warning on that! It really is not for the faint hearted. Yikes

Thanks Paul,

Do you ,mean the tumeric tea or the photo? I had photos taken every day, to show the extent of the damage and the healing process. I couldn't believe the simple stepping on a small pebble could cause some much damage.

Yes, I will add a warning and disclaimer.the photo may be gruesome to some viewers.

It is my understanding that tumeric can adversely interact with some medications and with diabetics. I will find the information and add it above.

Hi Randall

Yeah these split moments can be so critical. It really is mad.
You are more than welcome to check out my website any time. It is here:http://www.finalbug.net
As of now there is not a lot of activity on it. But I looked at the fist of the Habit forming videos you posted so who knows…

Background information is that there is a video application called Final Cut Pro and in many large cities on this planet there is a thing called a User Group e.g. Berlin Final Cut Pro User Group, Los Angeles Final Cut Pro User Group etc. Berlin might sound very big at 4 million but there are not enough people to justify regular face to face meetings these days. The landscape is also very different today. e.g. 10 years ago if I wanted to learn about FCP I did not have so many options

1) Read the manual (several thousand pages)
2) Learn by trial and error
3) Learn via forums
4) Get out of the house and go to a meeting
5) Buy a DVD
6) Or pay 1000$+ for a course

Today the meetings still work in LA and Boston but that is to the best of my knowledge about it. These days most people either go to one of 2/3 huge platforms and buy standard training XYZ or go to You Tube and watch stuff for free from kids like your great nephew’s. No offence. I am sure he is an amazing kid but I think you know what I am saying ;-) He might just be a little young and under qualified as of now…

There has to be some kind of middle ground where users X, Y and Z can make training material in a structured way and sell and swap it. What I really love is the idea of being able to swap stuff. So if I make a FCP course and someone else makes a Lightworks course we could swap courses for free. For users by users is my current motto…

This is also why I am so interested in Circles. Because on You Tube there way to separate the 40+ year old people who have been through the theme park a couple of times from the 13 year old who need to prove that age does not matter and he/she is just as good if not better than the old dogs etc. Which is possible but unlikely

Love the Ghadi quote at the end of the first Habit Forming video you posted:

http://2014.habitsummit.com/video/87544292

If you ever want me to give some feedback about your Site I would be very happy to oblige.

@ Mark

Show cases on the Stackideas Site are well and good. But it would be amazing if we had some kind of place where we could check each others Sites out!?! Like a show and tell section. I live in Germany currently and there is an saying that the children of the shoe maker often do not have shoes! Or another variation is that in the hand workers house, the corners are rounded!!! Which is a round about way of saying that I understand the the most amazing Social Community Component on the planet does not actually have in the strictest sense its own community...

thanks

Paul

Randall M wrote:

Mark wrote:

Thanks for sharing this Randall How have you been? Is everything okay there with your arms?

Thanks for asking Mark,

My right (dominant arm) is healing better than expected by my doctor after a tumble on my new rollerblades in late April. I can type again and use the mouse with my right hand as of a few days ago. The three breaks in the upper right shoulder were pinned together with 2 titanium plates and 12 titanium screws in a 5 1 /2 hour operation. I look back at the photos and I am so happy I don't have to go through all that pain now. The breaks were painful, but the torn bicep, upper shoulder and chest muscles that we're torn badly are slower to mend. The bruising was massive, and the blood clots kept coming back for over a month. I have an Olympic Team doctor treating me and I am well looked after. I lucked out and got the best doctor for my injury that I possibly could. So I feel fortunate.

It took one small pebble to bring me crashing down. The universe sent me a message to slow down a little. I have been feeling real good and have been walking the hiking trails these past few weeks, and I have been thinking lots about ES 1.3 and EB 4 and I'm looking forward to getting things back on track in anticipation of the betas.

Of course I am selling the rollerblades and decided there will be no more extreme hiking in my future. I skated for the past 54 years and that's half a century and I promised Elaine that that's enough. Time to keep my feet flat on the ground and get more involved with low impact water sports. I do like that synchronized swimming and ladies water ballet. I watched more TV and Youtube videos in the past two months than in the past 10 years combined. Ha ha.

I have been following all the message threads very closely and I'm looking forward to your blog post when you make the highly anticipated information about EasyBlog 4 available.

Ah, good to know that you are recovering faster than expected and glad to have you back It does sound really painful though. Hope that you will have speedy recovery!

While this thread moved to the topic of not being able to do much on my community because of an accident, it does make solo community managers and businesses think about the following:

What if you couldn't manage your social network or community of members? What would you do? Do you have a backup plan in place?

I created a new discussion thread to discuss this topic. While I hope nobody ever has to go through what I went through, I have always been the type of person to turn a negative into a positive. My accident got me thinking about this very topic these past few months, and I do believe it is a very important topic for community managers to discuss.

For participation and viewing of this new discussion go here:

What if you couldn't manage your social network or community of members?
http://stackideas.com/forums/what-if-you-couldn-t-manage-your-social-network-or-community-of-members

Mark wrote:

Randall M wrote:

Mark wrote:

Thanks for sharing this Randall How have you been? Is everything okay there with your arms?

Thanks for asking Mark, .... shortened

Ah, good to know that you are recovering faster than expected and glad to have you back It does sound really painful though. Hope that you will have speedy recovery!

Mark,

While I haven't been able to participate much in the forums in the way of adding things, I have been a very active reader and follower of all the interesting threads since my accident (wonders of the iPad) and I have learned lots. The biggest pain for me was not being able to type, but there is a reason for everything. I followed many threads and got to learn more about other members and what their sites are about and their ideas for the future of StackIdeas products. While my specialist doctor said it will take a solid year for my shoulder and muscles to heal so I have full use of my arm, he wants me to start using it to type and move the mouse so it does atrophy and stiffen up.

Elaine is shocked that I can type faster now then I could before my accident. She laughs and said maybe I should wear huge boxing gloves so I can't type during certain times of the day.

I am looking forward to more active participation and I am happy to be back and involved in the community.

Randall

Paul Murray wrote:

Hi Randall

Yeah these split moments can be so critical. It really is mad.
You are more than welcome to check out my website any time. It is here:http://www.finalbug.net
As of now there is not a lot of activity on it. But I looked at the fist of the Habit forming videos you posted so who knows…

Background information is that there is a video application called Final Cut Pro and in many large cities on this planet there is a thing called a User Group e.g. Berlin Final Cut Pro User Group, Los Angeles Final Cut Pro User Group etc. Berlin might sound very big at 4 million but there are not enough people to justify regular face to face meetings these days. The landscape is also very different today. e.g. 10 years ago if I wanted to learn about FCP I did not have so many options

1) Read the manual (several thousand pages)
2) Learn by trial and error
3) Learn via forums
4) Get out of the house and go to a meeting
5) Buy a DVD
6) Or pay 1000$+ for a course

Today the meetings still work in LA and Boston but that is to the best of my knowledge about it. These days most people either go to one of 2/3 huge platforms and buy standard training XYZ or go to You Tube and watch stuff for free from kids like your great nephew’s. No offence. I am sure he is an amazing kid but I think you know what I am saying ;-) He might just be a little young and under qualified as of now…

There has to be some kind of middle ground where users X, Y and Z can make training material in a structured way and sell and swap it. What I really love is the idea of being able to swap stuff. So if I make a FCP course and someone else makes a Lightworks course we could swap courses for free. For users by users is my current motto…

This is also why I am so interested in Circles. Because on You Tube there way to separate the 40+ year old people who have been through the theme park a couple of times from the 13 year old who need to prove that age does not matter and he/she is just as good if not better than the old dogs etc. Which is possible but unlikely

Love the Ghadi quote at the end of the first Habit Forming video you posted:

http://2014.habitsummit.com/video/87544292

If you ever want me to give some feedback about your Site I would be very happy to oblige.

@ Mark

Show cases on the Stackideas Site are well and good. But it would be amazing if we had some kind of place where we could check each others Sites out!?! Like a show and tell section. I live in Germany currently and there is an saying that the children of the shoe maker often do not have shoes! Or another variation is that in the hand workers house, the corners are rounded!!! Which is a round about way of saying that I understand the the most amazing Social Community Component on the planet does not actually have in the strictest sense its own community...

thanks

Paul

Paul,

It takes a while to gather community activity, and from your choice of subject matter for members, I am certain that your community will become a huge success. FCP is something I actively used years ago, and I know that it has a huge following of users. I will look further at your site and if you want I can give you feedback to help you in any areas that you want my feedback. My second software company from 1995 to 2001 focused on video and we used Final Cut Pro extensively for the video content used in LiveStage Professional - our flagship interactive QuickTime video authoring tool.

Online learning communities such as your community are a growing popular niche, and there is definitely a need for such a community. While Lynda.com provides some training, it is not updated on a daily basis and their is no active participation community like you are working on. You have an edge to carve out your niche community for finalbug.net.

Best of all is that you are an active member of this community and a huge fan of StackIdeas products. As you build and evolve your community I am certain you will have a significant impact and contribution to evolve EasySocial and Techjoomla's Shika extensions. I haven't had a chance to look at the Circles but it sounds like a solution for a huge problem that exists in many communities.

I am also building an online learning community and it will be good to share ideas so we can each improve our communities for our members.

I look forward to more discussions and will be adding myself as a member of your site in the next few days so I can get a better understanding of your community when I get back from my visit with family.

Randall

Paul,

You might be interested in taking a look at this niche community focused on animation: http://www.aniboom.com/

I really like the simplicity of the layout and navigation of this site. While it does not appear to have a social stream that I can tell, it does some some nice design features for members to participate.

I look at a lot of niceh communities for ideas and found aniboom.com listed in this article:
60+ Niche Social Networks Marketers Should Know About by Stephanie Frasco
https://www.convertwithcontent.com/60-niche-social-networks-marketers/

Randall

The following niche community has a beautiful easy to use and navigate UI, and it is what I am working towards over the next month with my community now that I can start working on the UI and look and feel of my site again.

https://untappd.com/

Another very good article on Buildoing an Online Community

Building on the Basics: 3 Steps to Be an Online Community Builder - Maya Paveza

If you are already an online community builder or aspire to be one, our goal at Follr is to make the experience as simple and fun as possible. As we continue our series on building a solid foundation for success with online communities we will focus on creating the community identity.

http://follr.com/

When creating a community you should have a clear definition of the community focus and purpose. Creating the community mission statement, as well as a comprehensive list of related keywords, is more important than many understand. Focusing on the recommendations here will result in an increase of online community engagement, interaction and posting, once you’ve opened your doors to your new community.
As soon as people read the term “key words” their minds automatically connect the term with search engine optimization (SEO), in this case that is a secondary benefit of your primary purpose. The primary purpose is to help focus on the content and direction of the online community you are building. Once you have a good list of 10-15 keywords, or terms, related to the community you are building, and the mission statement you defined, you will see a true community begin to form.

3 Steps to Be an Online Community Builder resulting in huge Online Community Engagement

Read more at http://www.business2community.com/online-communities/building-basics-3-steps-online-community-builder-0910703#FB6rDuU7UwUB3osu.99

Community Managers: Who Are They and What Do They Do?
Jennifer Hanford, June 19, 2014 - published on business2community.com

Did you know that January 27th, 2014, marked an important milestone for online community managers? Why? Because on this date, community managers everywhere celebrated the fifth annual Community Manager Appreciation Day.

The number of online community managers has more or less exploded since the first Community Manager Appreciation Day…and their presence keeps growing at a rapid pace. As more and more organizations realize there is much more to social media marketing than just tweeting and Facebook-ing, the more they see the need to hire someone as part of a successful social media strategy.

Just who are these community managers? Loosely defined, community managers are the people who run online communities. The communities, themselves, typically revolve around companies, nonprofit organizations, university alumni associations, common interest groups, etc. Online community managers help grow and maintain their communities through a variety of activities. Common activities include blogging, Twitter chats, and LinkedIn discussions, just to name a few examples. In other words, community managers are tasked with doing whatever it takes to create an alluring online atmosphere which both attracts and retains its members.

Read more at http://www.business2community.com/online-communities/community-managers-0920386#km2mlxZBzYgU1Lty.99

Hi Randall

What I liked off the top of my head:

http://www.aniboom.com/
Is very cool. Very simple and clear :-)

https://untappd.com/
Looks great but I had problems registering with FB!

Looks great:

https://dribbble.com/

Could have a mix of profile updates, projects, courses etc

Could imagine doing this with:

http://www.tigracon.com/socialboards-for-jomsocial-easysocial-and-combuilder

http://letterboxd.com/

Very simple idea done with a lot of style

http://dpadd.com/

Wow, just wow

http://dpadd.com/

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Jq5tANZ6QBs#t=82

Love the idea of using a screen grabber and showing people how things work :-)

http://ufosocial.com/home.php

What i like at the UFO site were the options, Members Last Logged In/Newest Members/Popular Members

Kind of like the bird site:

http://www.birdpost.com/

Also liked this:

http://gentlemint.com/

Whilst I found the Site:

http://www.snooth.com/social/

horrible there motto is cool Drinking alone? = Learning alone?

One to follow up:

https://www.behance.net/

Some how loved the design on this one!

http://www.burdastyle.com/

Also cool design:

http://www.curbly.com/

Also not an eye catcher but very simple and clean:

http://www.patientslikeme.com/

For a learning portal my top 3:

http://www.aniboom.com/
http://dpadd.com/
https://dribbble.com/

more later

Paul

My reading is slower as your typing.

Interesting to hear about the other hat you wore

Paul,

The sites are very interesting. I plan to spend more time looking at them next week. It's always good to look at designs of other sites.

Here is a good article for starting an Online Community. I read Feverbee.com religiously and this article is good primer:

Building An Online Community: How To Start From 0 Members

Starting from 0 members is hard. We don’t discuss it enough. There are many ways to start an online community. It’s easier if you already have an audience. Darren Rowse, Ramit Sethi, Seth Godin etc can launch huge online communities in a matter of days (but they spent years building up that audience first). If you don't have engaged audience, this should help.

First decide who your community is for. Be specific. Identify real people you want in it. Then try to figure out what they really care about. Your community doesn’t have to be about your brand. It’s usually easier if it isn’t. Look at what your potential members do in their spare time, what do they spend their money on? What image do they try to portray to others? What do they talk about online?

Read More here: http://www.feverbee.com/2010/10/startinganonlinecommunity.html

This is another good primer article for Online Community Building from FeverBee.com

Make The Community About Your Members
by Richard Millington, Feverbee.com

This sounds obvious, but it's ignored often.

Make the community about your members.

Not the brand, but the members. Communities about brands usually struggle. The concept, content, activities, and discussions aren’t interesting enough to sustain a long-term discussion.

You see this when there is a community about a brand’s products, with content about the latest product news (upcoming releases), activities asking members to vote which particular features of the product they like best, and overly-optimistic discussions about when members first used the product. This betrays a startling lack of respect for your audience.

Read more of the article here:
http://www.feverbee.com/2012/09/make-the-community-about-your-members.html

Final post for this weekend. A video discussion on:

Tips For Starting A New Online Community, Attracting New Members, & Encouraging Contribution



Published on Oct 17, 2012 on Youtube.com
ProCommunity Episode #14 - Join me for a discussion with Paul Resnick of the University of Michigan and co-author of the book Building Successful Online Communities: Evidence-Based Social Design. We discuss: • The fundamental elements of a successful online community • The challenges to creating a thriving online community • Advice for companies planning to launch an online customer or user community • How to start and grow a new online community • Lessons from offline organizations for how to improve onboarding processes • The role of community managers in build commitment among new members • Techniques that community managers can use to deal with conflict • How to drive member contributions in an online community • Common mistakes organizations make when planning an online community • Setting up systems to create and maintain productive social relationships • The power and pitfalls of gamification in your online community.

For anyone interested here are some very rough notes that I made for the above excellent video:

Importance of getting people involved intro
People, Content, reacting around content!

Before launch, clear sense of value proposition. Who and Why

Distribution channel

Finding a Niche

How to get to Critical Mass

Big people on as Cohorts Idea?

The Hazing ritual. Online Community Boot Camp

Good if the tasks help the Community/gets involved!

Task = become legitimate member

Deal with people rather than bots is an advantage of a community!?!

Introducing people/welcome them into community

Being pro active rather than reactive…

Driving contributions

Lots of thoughts about badges and how they are good for figuring out who is up to what!!!

Design decisions help shape the community = think through technical and social!

And yes "keywords" are music to my ears.

This is probably the single biggest feature that distinguishes FCPX (they jumped from FCP7 to X) from the other NLE editing systems.

I attempted to cover that here:

http://finalbug.net/blog/entry/358-waiting-for-fcp-x-1-1-part-01

It is all Boolean from here on in:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?list=PLqNRVhvpQvvvt0FtrYBpr8xBqLnGEI9Vb&v=sdx9dACkvyI#t=16

On a side note I would love to see more Boolean like functions in the Search ES Search functions. But that is just me.

Boolean, Boolean and more Boolean