Group projects are all about collaboration and
communication, so it pays to seek out every possible way to communicate
with other group members. We’ve already looked at web mail and instant
messaging, social network groups and groupware, but there are even more
ways to handle your group communications.
Evaluating Blogs for Collaboration
If you’ve been on the Internet for any length of time, you’ve probably heard something about blogs. A blog (short for “web log”) is a kind of online journal that its author updates frequently with new musings and information.
In terms of organization, a blog is a collection of individual posts
or messages. The posts are arranged in reverse chronological order,
with the newest posts at the top—which makes it easy to keep track of
the latest developments. Older posts are relegated to the blog archives,
which are generally accessible via a link in the sidebar column. And,
at the end of each post, you’ll find a link to comments; this is where
blog readers can register their own personal comments about any given
post.
But here’s what makes
blogs really powerful. A blog doesn’t have to be the work of a single
author; it can include posts from multiple contributors, as well as
comments on each of those posts. This makes a blog ideal for keeping
track of progress on a group project.
Here’s how it goes. You
create your blog, hosted on your company’s servers or on a popular
blogging tool such as Blogger or WordPad. You make it a private blog and
assign authorship status to all the members of your team. This means
that everyone on your team can initiate new posts, as well as comment on
the posts of others.
When you have something
important to say to the group, you make a blog post. Same with the other
members; when they have updated info, they post it. In addition, other
members can comment on your posts—for example, you can create a post to
schedule a meeting, and have the other members comment on your post with
their replies.
Note
Your blog posts don’t
have to be text only (although they can be). Most blogs let you include
digital photos, blueprints, and other graphics, as well as audio and
video files, in your posts.
Members of your group can
access the blog by navigating to its web page to see what’s new, or
subscribe to an RSS feed that will notify them whenever there’s a new
post to the blog, so they’re never in the dark.
Where can your blog be
hosted? If you work for a large company, ask your IT department about
hosting your blog on the company’s servers. Otherwise, you can check out
any of the following blog-hosting communities, all of which will let
you create private group blogs.
Blogger
Blogger (www.blogger.com)
is Google’s blog-hosting community, and with more than 8 million
individual blogs, the largest blog host on the Internet. All Blogger
blogs are free, which contributes to their popularity.
The Blogger Dashboard, shown in Figure 1,
is where you manage all your blog activity. From here you can create
new blog posts, edit comments to your posts, manage your Blogger account
and profile, and access Blogger’s help system. It’s also where you
create a new blog.
Creating a new Blogger
blog is as easy as filling in a few forms. After you click the Create a
Blog link in the Blogger Dashboard, you’re asked to enter a title for
your blog and a corresponding blog address (the part of the URL that
goes before Blogger’s blogspot.com domain). Next, you get to choose a
template for your blog—a predesigned combination of page layout, colors,
and fonts. Blogger now creates your blog—and you’re ready to start
posting.
Note
By default, Blogger
serves as host for your blog, and assigns you a URL in the blogspot.com
domain. If you’d rather host your blog on your own website, that option
is also available.
Figure 2
shows a typical Blogger blog—if there is such a beast as a “typical”
blog. You can customize your blog with any number of different templates
and color schemes; you can also add a variety of gadgets and other
nonpost page elements.
Of course, one of the
things you’ll want to customize is the list of people who have access
to you blog. By default, a Blogger blog is completely public, and anyone
on the Internet can read it. However, there’s a way to make your blog
private so that only invited guests can view it; just go to the Blogger
Dashboard, click the Manage: Settings link, and then click the
Permissions link. When the next page appears, go to the Blog Readers
section and select who can view your blog: Anybody (keeps the blog
public), Only People I Choose, or Only Blog Authors.
For a group blog, the option
you want is Only Blog Authors. Of course, you now have to invite the
other members of your group to be blog authors; do this by clicking the
Add Authors button.
Note
In Blogger parlance, a blog author
is someone who, like you, can create new blog postings. Although anyone
can add comments to existing postings, only blog authors can create new
postings.
TypePad
TypePad (www.typepad.com)
is quite similar to Blogger. You can customize your blog with a number
of different designs and widgets, and you can select multiple coauthors
for your blog. However, TypePad isn’t free; you pay anywhere from $4.95
to $89.95 per month, depending on the features you want. (You need at
least the Pro plan, starting at $14.95/month, to support multiple
co-authors.)
WordPress
WordPress (www.wordpress.com)
is another popular blog-hosting community. It’s a lot like both Blogger
and TypePad, but perhaps a bit more customizable. You get lots of
themes to choose from, sidebar widgets, and a private members-only
option. You also can create multiple blogs and assign multiple authors.
And, like Blogger, a WordPress blog is completely free.
Note
Facebook, MySpace,
and other social networks also include blogs as part of their profile
pages—as do many online groupware and web-based desktop applications.
