Basics
This seminar is presented as part of the Inge de Waard of the Institute of Tropical Medicine Antwerp. Vodcasting is essentially video blogging. It is thought of as part of web 2.0. It is essentially a social media tool and (pedagogically) is designed to be part of a feedback loop. Participation is thought to be very important. The scenario for the seminar is at: http://www.ignatiawebs.blogspot.com/
The software used here is mostly freeware. Indeed we are using blogger as the basis of ths seminar so I don't have to create a new blog (blasted alien keyboard).
I'm not on my PC but I am told that we need the latest java applets and the latest windows player and the latest flash media player.
Video compressing software.
Inge believes that the software must include accessibility for mobile devices because many more mobile devices are sold than computers.
File naming should include no spaces and be in title case.
We are looking to add a widget by going to http://creativecommons.org/ to 'hunt down' a licence. We found a list of licences at http://creativecommons.org/international/uk/ . You can use these licences for your http://www.flickr.com/ pictures too. These licences can be embedded (html) in your blog via the template page.
Inge is having trouble finding the javascript widget on the creative commons site so we "will get some video compression going". Ah, sadly this didn't work either as the Windows Movie Maker doesn't work properly.
We access Windows Movie Maker via Programs: Functions on left: audio/video lines at the bottom.
Import video (avi, Mpeg etc)
Drag movie into bottom line
Add video effects and audio effects (click and drag effects). Adding these is fun but the main reason is to compress the file. To do so just 'publish the movie in a different format'. The best setting is 512kbps. The higher the rate the higher the quality but (for instance) developing countries will need a greater compression rate. 2.28gb file is more than halved at 512kbps. In this case the output is Mpeg (2 we think). We could have output as a flash file or a quicktime file. The Mpeg is standard for WMP but quicktime is slightly more cross-platform compliant.
Compressing files also speeds up the opening of your blog (i.e. is slows it down with a full size file)
WMM is complete with the windows operating system. iMovie is also usable.
http://www.blip.tv/ is Inge's broadcast software of choice.
I didn't use blip.tv because I couldn't generate a thumbnail because I couldn't read the German menus on the Paint software.
h264 coding is important for some reason but I have absolutely no idea why.
A feed reader is a bit of software which looks for .xml files. It uses RSS feeds to drag in posts/data from elsewhere.
To make the RSS icon 'a reality on your blog' we have used feedburner to produce a little application which we can paste in using 'add a page element'. That should allow people to 'stay updated on the latest information'. This is of course vitally important in the fast moving world of Holdsworth renovation - I don't think.
Further things to look up are twitter (microblogging); Delicious bookmarks (http://del.icio.us/).
Some colleagues were of the opinion that this web 2.0 social tools pose a threat to copyright and the integrity of examination. Ingrid recommends going to Stephen Downes' presentation.
She recommends a site called http://www.nosignificant.difference.org/ which shows nsd by simply using new media to present old material. The inference is that new media need new pedagogy.
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