http://slideshare.net
Nothing better exemplifies the technical dimensions of knowledge networking than Slideshare: a presentation, in powerpoint format, is uploaded to Slideshare. While it is available at that site (searchable via Google, or found by looking for a specific author at the site), more often than not, the resulting online presentation is then embedded in a blog or website elsewhere. In other words, knowledge networking involves online knowledge creation and distrubution through linked online applications – the network is the network of enabling technologies which create an apparently singular presence online, but which is actually multiple.
The basics
Slideshare has become the default standard for publishing powerpoint presentations online and sharing them with others. Simply upload your powerpoints and then share them. A key feature of Slideshare is that the presentations can be embedded in other web publications (such as this site), easily and effectively. Slideshare also allow documents and other digital artefacts to be uploaded and shared. There are group and discussion features which make Slideshare particularly useful for conversational interaction about presentations. Most of all, using slideshare means never having to email someone the presentation you just gave – simply finish each presentation with a reference to your slideshare collection!
The following Slideshare-published presentation discusses the use of Slideshare in education:
Pedagogic Challenge
Powerpoint can be a curse: to make a good powerpoint presentation is not as easy as it looks; to deliver it, in person, is harder still. Online presentations are different again: there is no voice to amplify or expand on the slides, though Slideshare does allow for notes to be provided for each slide. A challenge for students is to recognise that digital creativity can mean developing and publishing an online slide presentation that is specifically designed and only to be accessed via that channel – this is not the same as simply ‘putting’ the slides for a talk up online via slideshare (a habit which many of us are now in). On the other hand, the constrained form of expression which something like slides online offers, forces students to make good choices about how to explain, in a simple way, complex ideas and communicate them through their organised creative work, rather than via a dialogic presentation with questions and answers. This kind of constraint actually creates the conditions for more creative expression.
Alternatives
Because Slideshare (rather like Powerpoint!) is so commonly used, there is not much point in going elsewhere, though Slideserve is one possibility. Other applications and services exist, but they tend to focus on the actual creation of the presentations rather than simply being an upload site. Scribd, however, has achieved a similar status for online written content as Slideshare (beware its policies on archived content designed to make money from your work!). You can also upload presentations to Scribd.
Read…
JISC, a UK higher education and IT organisation, has an excellent guide to using Slideshare
Barker, K. 2009. Pushing Past PowerPoint with Web 2.0 Tools. SIDLIT Conference Proceedings. Paper 34.
Paoletti, G. et al. 2008. Presentation Manager And Web2.0: Understanding Online Presentations. Beyond Knowledge: The Legacy of Competence
Part V-II: 287-289,
