From a Microsoft blog, here's a matrix summarizing the relative advantages and disadvantages of RSS and email for marketing. It's called, Email v RSS, let us move on…, and links to several articles and blogs. Reported by Steve Rubel.
Bill Gates has turned his attention to blogs and RSS in a speech that several journalists are comparing to his “infamous Pearl Harbor Day email he sent to his troops nearly a decade ago, in which he “declared war” on the then nascent World Wide Web.” So it will be really interesting to see what happens next.
The Public Knowledge Project is a Canadian initiative that “seeks to improve the scholarly and public quality of academic research through innovative online environments.” One of their current research projects, funded by SSHRC, “will investigate how journal websites can be designed to better support the reading of research in online settings for a wider range of readers than has traditionally been the case with research. Given that well over 75 percent of research journals now publish online, with a number of them made free to read, the reading experience and audience for research is changing. This study will look at whether the design and structure of the journal’s “information environment” can improve the reading experience of expert and novice readers of this literature.” Potentially very valuable.
The Public Knowledge Project also offers to collaborate with organizations that are seeking to publish scientific literature online.
One of the news sources they point to is a great blog on the Open Access Initiative by Peter Suber. Here's an entry from yesterday – an announcement that Google is partnering with CrossRef to allow users to search for scientific literature across nine key publishers including Oxford University Press and the Nature Publishing Group.
Today Google released a new version of Blogger (a free service that provides the blog I'm using here). The new Blogger adds lots of functionality as well as much nicer template designs. Here are some samples of the 33 new designs: 'dots', 'minima', or if your tastes lean to the garish, no.565.
To create a new blog, just go to Blogger. There is no reason you can't use this as a web site for your organization or program if you don't mind the simplicity. Another approach is to use the blog for announcements, news or updates, and link to it from your organization's home page. It can automatically be updated through emails (in other words, staff can email updates to a special secret email address, and they will be posted on the web site), so you don't need to train updaters. The blog can be configured to accept email postings as drafts, and not to make them public until an administrator has approved them.
