New book trailer - Stabat Mater

See Dragonfly Media Publishing’s newest book trailer: Stabat Mater, a play by Lauree Laing.

Three waiting women. Three epic ages. One unimaginable purgatory: Awaiting the return of a child gone off to war. Critically-acclaimed playwright Lauree Laing weaves insight, humour and depth into this one-act play, creating a masterfully written story of love balancing hate, peace balancing anger. Herself a mother of a Canadian solder, Laing gives us a glimpse into the shadowed souls of the families left behind, allowing us to journey briefly through the tortured minds of the mothers who remain.

Buy Stabat Mater now »

Summer Camp for Grown Ups

We all remember the build up to summer camp: the excitement and nerves. And then getting shipped off to spend a few days exploring our new surroundings, learning from each other and generally having a blast.

Think those days are over? Think again. Enter PodCamp, the conference for adults where professionals teach professionals what they know.

The idea is based on a social sharing concept, very similar to Web 2.0 rationale. We are the experts in our chosen field. We all have something to contribute to the global community.

But don’t take my word for it. Hear what others have to say about PodCamp:

“I regularly present at 30+ conferences a year, almost all with paid staff and organizers. This conference was in the top 5 best organized out of all of those… Even now, in the weeks after Podcamp, we’re all still talking about how great it was.” - Jared Spool, User Interface Engineering

“PodCamp Boston was a great experience, something I would recommend to others to join and support and something I look forward to being a part of in the future.” - Jeff Pulver, VON

“I had a great time today at Podcamp Boston 2, a new media expo at the Boston Convention Center full of podcasters, bloggers, and other new media folks. There was so much energy in the room - with everyone taking pictures, blogging, podcasting, and twittering - it was reminiscent of SXSW.” - Stephanie Rogers, PARTNERS+simons

It’s called the “Conference in the Hallway” and may be the summer perk you were looking for.

Sneak Peak - Windigo

Here’s a sneak peak at Dragonfly Media Publishing’s upcoming publication, Windigo. The novel follows Lily Montgomery, a modern witch encountering an ancient evil in Munising, Michigan. Coming Summer 2008!

Sustainable Scientist Blog

Here’s a blog that is not just colourful and interesting, but well written, researched and uses great graphics. The Sustainable Scientist is written by Jenifer McIntyre, a PhD student at the U. of Washington, a NOAA star recipient and a great writer (who knew someone could be so left and right brained at the same time?)

Check out her most recent entry: http://sustainablescientist.blogspot.com/

Going With The Flow

You’ve been asked to create a Process Flowchart for a marketing initiative for work and your first thought is: “A what?!”

A process flowchart is simply an organizational chart mapping the many steps required to fulfill a specific task, such as creating and distributing an e-newsletter or posting new content on your website.

Here is a detailed document describing how to create your own process flowchart as well as a few examples of simple charts that have already been created.

• How to create and distribute an e-newsletter.
• How to create and upload new content to your website.

Book “Claire’s Bear” Reaches Record Sales!

Recently published children’s book by Dragonfly Media Publishing called Claire’s Bear phenomenally outsold all previous sales and was featured on lulu.com in its “Top 100 Sellers” section as one of the highest selling books for that day.

Examples of Online Research Tools - Limited Time

Want to see the card sort and online survey software in action? Take the Wild About Gardening survey and card sort to get a taste of the form and function of these essential online researching tools. Check it out now — it’s only available until Feb. 22, 2008!

GHG in the spotlight

I would say only a very small percentage of the millions of blogs out there are worth reading. This is one of them. The GHG Spot is a hip, urban, lifestyle blog written by two hip, urban chicks trying to reduce their personal greenhouse gas emissions. The blog is part of the Canadian Wildlife Federation’s climate change program, whose slogan is: “Climate Change is in your hands.” The blog follows through on that mandate.

It’s a fun, light-hearted look at what is most often portrayed as a “doom-and-gloom” issue. The entries are frequent enough, filled in with current climate change news, and humourous (for example, the most recent entry is “So you think your boys can swim?“)

Add this blog’s RSS news feed to your reader - you won’t regret it!

Finding suitable survey software

We want it all, don’t we? We want to do our research using global tools online. It must be free, easy to use and adaptable. What’s amazing is that these sort of web applications are out there. There is an OptimalSort-type of tool for online surveys.

I give you (well, not me but through me) SurveyMonkey.com. It’s intro says it all: “Intelligent survey software for primates of all species. SurveyMonkey has a single purpose: to enable anyone to create professional online surveys quickly and easily.”

There are some hitches, of course. To use the free version, you can only ask a maximum of 10 questions and are unable to brand your survey. But to the empty-of-pocket and wildly-desperate, who cares?

Sorting through card sorts

Card sorts are an effective means of organizing your content when you are creating or redesigning a website. This method allows you to get beyond your own perseptions of what the content architecture should be and allows you ask those who will actually care — your users.

There are loads of online card sorting tools, but the best I’ve run across is OptimalSort, a beta site that allows you to upload your content, set parametres such as allowing the user to create their categories (or use ones you’ve defined), promotes your sort and then delivers the results to you in a comprehensive way. I recently had a successful experience using OptimalSort in a study that broadcasted to more than 30,000 people (imagine the number of results!)

While in the IA stage, I would recommend combining an online card sort, which can survey thousands, with a hands-on, in-house sort using pen and paper, stock cards, individual test subjects and your own eyes. In the end, nothing beats observation in testing!

If you’ve found a better online card sort tool than this one, please let me know.