“Blogs, Wikis, Podcasts”

I just finished reading “Blogs, Wikis, Podcasts, and Other Powerful Web Tools for Classrooms” by Will Richardson.  It was an easy and engaging read and I would recommend it for anyone interested in the internet, even if you are not a parent, teacher, or student.  Richardson aptly walks the reader through the what, how, and why of collaboration and web publishing from an educational stand point (again, this book is appropriate for anyone, the educational tie-ins are interesting in their own right and the tools and methods are for everybody).

However, one aspect particularly caught my attention while reading, and that was the shoddy editing.  Ever since I have been in college I have been highly disappointed by textbook authors who take the time to tweak the material in their books enough to require a new edition which costs amazing amounts and yet has flagrant spelling, punctuation, formatting, grammar, and/or usage errors.   I will give some examples from Richardson’s book:

“Export as MP” instead of “MP3″ on page 121.   “the file resulting file size will be bigger” where “the file” at the beginning does not belong page 123.  There are sporadic examples of misplaced commas etc… but there are also more glaring problems with the text, such as using RSS as “Rich Site Summary” in the introduction and as “Really Simple Syndication” in the chapter on RSS (both are correct but refer to different versions, see wikipedia for more).  This is a problem because the book is aimed at those who are less than savvy with technology, it shows a gap in his awareness of his audience.   And audience awareness is something he preaches frequently in the book.

To the point.  I enjoyed the book and though poor editing pains me, I recognize that it could be worse than a few clumsy sentences and points of confusion.  I am using Richardson’s book to encourage wikis to be used in all aspects of writing.  For instance, Richardson could, for future editions of his book maybe, put his book in a wiki (dividing it up by chapter or page or whatever) and have either the internet community or a select group of peers come in and edit his book.  Maybe he’ll even let me edit it.  The changes could be clarification questions and grammar/spelling/punctuation fixes or they could be contributions and supplementation by others with experience in the edu-tech field.  Ideally, in terms of wiki purity, the book could be started by Richardson and then continuously written by others and be an open, editable, free resource for everyone.  However, the book is designed for people who are not using the tools already and who would probably be more comfortable using a hard copy book (vs. ebook) to learn about it, so a traditional book makes sense.  Also, I recognize that Richardson is a teacher and might like to have some spare income for food.