Internet Web 2.0 Interactive Tools You Need to Know

Hacking the spew with efficiency means using tools both to increase your influence, and to grok what you need to know as timely and quickly as possible.

Broadcast

• Blog

• Video (embedded, portfolio)

• Images (embed, by topic)

• Comment

Collaborate

• Wikis

• Discussion Groups (Google, LinkedIn)

Stay Connected

• Your friends

• Your colleagues

• Your future

Professional

Social

Stay Informed

• News

• Feeds

• Twendz

Learn

Browse

Entertainment

• download

• live events

Blogging – This is well established, so how come you need to know more about this? Well, you know what they are; you probably blog yourself. Blogging is short for Web Logging, which could be as self-centered as guess what I did today, to as epic as the next great Earth novel, in small pieces. Blog software like Wordpress is morphing into website software  (blogs and pages).  This is enhanced by plug-in modules freely contributed that make adding functionality to your site much easier. “easier” here means instead of writing code yourself, you just need to figure out how to install the plug-in, activate it, and integrate it in with your site controls.

Twittering - Broadcast your thoughts in 140 characters. Tiny, yes, but enough for a headline or comment along with a link (which can be compressed using several tools) to something you think is interesting or timely. Could be a picture you took uploaded to twitpic. Following people who broadcast useful information which you can find by looking for them or using a search term will help you find people twittering about that subject. Tools like Twendz do this for you. As you browse these, you can find folks who you find useful or entertaining.  You can use a tool like Tweetdeck to keep track of interest threads.  This is like getting a pipe of targeted information.

Facebook

RSS Feeds

Wikis

FriendFeed

What about these?

Here’s a compendium grouped by type.  If you are broadcasting words, pictures, or video do you want your content to live at these sites or at your own website? Many TOS (terms of service) agreements state that you are giving up your rights to the content by storing it at a ‘free’ site.  While some sites allow you to share, and many sites are now gaining a foothold by asking you permission to link to your friends, your blogs, your photo collections at places like FriendFeed, if you want to maintain control, you are better off putting your content on your site.