IMARK Lesson 6: Subscriptions, Feeds and Syndication

Users get the ability to subscribe to their content by Really Simple Syndication (RSS) or XML feeds via most web 2.0 and social networking services. Instead of users checking on the website for new content, the content reaches the user through a feed reader.

Most content management systems follow web standards for publishing content. Modern content management systems can generate RSS automatically, every time a new content is published. RSS, XML and Atom are similar technologies. The process of generating these automated updates is called Syndication.

Others such as feed readers which are web or desktop applications allow a user to easily add, read and organize subscriptions. One can choose between browser based readers, feed reader clients, email clients with feed reading features or web based services to keep and organize one’s subscriptions. Feed readers present users and content creators with many advantages in terms of information control, format flexibility and reaching an audience for instance the FAO agrifeeds.

IMARK Lesson 5: Group Productivity and Collaboration Tools

Groupware allows for fostering collaboration in the group and make processes more efficient and productive. There is a wide variety of tools available on the internet to support different interaction levels: communication, conferencing and collaboration.

Email continues to be the basic and most popular way to communicate over the internet. It is a good idea to use email and email based tools when requirements are one-to-one, or users have low connectivity communications.

Blogs allow sharing, accessing and easily updating information while Wikis can be an extremely versatile collaboration tool for creating and editing documents, documenting, translating and other tasks. There are some other useful tools such as video and image sharing and podcasting. Instant messaging allows the communication with others in real time. All IM applications allow text messaging, but some of them have incorporated video and voice conversations. Voice over Internet Protocol (VoIP) applications and services allow users to make high quality, low cost calls over the internet.

Contact databases and Customer Relationship Management (CRM) help to keep contact information organized and up to date, manage events, donations and follow up on campaigns and newsletters. On the other hand, project management tools include software for scheduling, managing budget and resources, following up on tasks and workflows, graphics and charts of the progress of the project and some communications and document sharing features. These tools can help support all distributed projects.

IMARK Lesson 4: Current Issues and New Ideas

The latest trends in technology and the growth of social networks surely prompt the creation of new services and features. Many social media sites are adapting their tools for mobile use. In Africa and Asia mobile phones are used to sustain development, delivering news about market prices in agriculture and fishery.

Geotagging is now adding geographical information to an image, a blog post, SMS messages, a video or other items, creating data maps. Mash-ups can also be created via google maps.

Different groups and developers can use the power of social networks to facilitate collaborative translation and content localization.

Web 3.0 which is smarter than web 2.0 address aspects of the internet that are potentially possible but not yet feasible from a technical or practical perspective. The web 3.0 is considered the 3^rd generation of internet. Protocols and technologies are however still under development.

IMARK Lesson 3: Privacy, Intellectual Property and Access to Social Media

Lesson 3 stresses on the fact that organizations and individuals need to be aware of some of the issues around the uses of social media and the challenges they present. It also highlights the following:

·         User agreement with terms and conditions

·         Securing of information with safe passwords

·         Good practices of individual privacy

·         Intellectual Property

·         Free/open source software

·         Reliability of content

Good practices are important to ensure privacy and security of data and information when using social media services. The internet now makes it easy to share and distribute electronic resources, and this sparks a debate on intellectual property and legal and technical implications.

Aside from public domain, there are alternative models for licensing content and software on the web. These are called creative common licences. Web 2.0 tools and social networking sites may face difficult conditions of access especially when working with a slow-speed internet or the use of inadequate hardware.

IMARK Lesson 2: Social Networking Sites and Communication

Lesson 2 shows us that a social networking site enables users to create public profiles within a Web site and form relationships with other users who access their profile information for instance facebook. Those services offer different ways to interact with others such as chat rooms, message boards, blogs, video, file sharing, email messages. One can easily post digital pictures and get in touch with other users.

These different social networking services offer different features and cater to different audiences. Some sites are:

·         Preferred in a specific geographic location for instance people from the middle east have more users in facebook.

·         Oriented to youth for instance a large part of the audience is the youngsters.

·         Business or marketplaces for instance linkedin.

·         Specifically oriented towards professional networks, and

·         Dedicated to networking for social development

The use of social networking can present many strategic advantages for groups or organizations, but can also pose new challenges in terms of privacy and security.