Blog5_1010032_Web2.0Tool_WIZIQ

My current lifestyle and work environment are not very Web 2.0 tool friendly. I read many posts from my classmates and really tried hard to find a tool that would make my work easier. Somehow. I thought about my work, then I thought about school. My AR project came aboard and I thought since I am creating a video tutorial which will be embedded in Powerpoint presentation I might use one of the Web 2.0 tools for sharing PP slides. Once the project is completed I can share the slides with my critical friends from work to help me evaluate and make final finishes without even calling a meeting to share my files. That would be very convenient! I was very excited to come across WIZIQ application. In this application you can upload many documents, from word documents, to spreadsheets to Powerpoint presentations to movies. Almost all formats are included. Not waiting too long I had uploaded my Brain Analogy presentation from MLT class - it was created on my Macbook. Meanwhile, my son was creating a PP presentation on earthquakes for his science class on his PC laptop. After uploading my PP I was quite disappointed. My headlines did not align and my embedded little animation did not even show, leaving my final slide with plain old white space right in the center. After few tries with different extension I still didn't give up and decided it must be the mac vs. windows incompatibility. I uploaded my son's PP and was just as disappointed, his embedded animations did not animate in WIZIQ. But at least he got the image frame (his headlines we not aligned the same as viewed through Powerpoint). I still didn't give up. I uploaded the PP as a movie - another huge disappointment. The movie came with terrible resolution, there was no way of any edits other than sharing and tagging abilities. At this point I decided that WIZIQ is maybe not the best tool. I went on searching for other Web 2.0 tools that share PP presentations. I ended up on slideshare.net. After about 3 hours of the same experiences I have to say that the file sharing tools online are great, only if you're sharing less complicated files with plain text, steady images or flattened pdfs. The sites are fantastic in letting you use the space, upload quite fast and are free and very easy to navigate (I had no problems finding my way around the sites). Unfortunately, if you are dealing with more complicated original files, you're still stuck running around with a flash drive and transfering files. Another option is to call your friends to your computer to view with you. Which in some cases might not be such a bad idea - you can count that as the social interaction and keep such needed balance in your life.

Before typing this blog I thought of finding a better, easier tool and concentrating on positive influence of Web 2.0 tools which are a plenty. However, on a second thought the assignment did not specify to positively comment on your findings; it said to use it to create something for your learning environment and describe the findings. And that is exactly what I did. I also thought that if my classmates see my frustration from tonight they might have some other suggestions and solutions for sharing more complicated Powerpoint presentations on the web.

WIZIQ logo, courtesy of WIZIQ.com