August 2011

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(whoops, we originally posted the wrong audio for this episode.  Corrected as of Aug 28. Sorry about that!)

Google Reader Resources:

Google Reader home page (you’ll need to sign in first.)

Google Reader help page

Google Reader blog. Consider subscribing to keep up to date on the newest happens in Google Reader!

RSS in Plain English video  (3 minutes. An explanation of RSS by the folks at CommonCraft. They make GREAT explanatory videos.  Go to the CommonCraft website and take a look at the other videos too!)

Getting Started with Google Reader video (2 minutes. Covers signing up and adding subscriptions/feeds.)

Reading Feeds in Google Reader video (3 minutes. Covers reading and organizing feeds, and keyboard shortcuts.)

Sharing Items with Google Reader video (2 minutes. Covers various sharing options.  NOTE: the “sharing settings” link is no longer in the left sidebar.  To get to sharing settings, go to manage settings on the bottom of the left sidebar, and select folders & tags from the top menu.)

A few of our Google Reader Tips:

• The easiest way to get to google reader is just to type the following in your browser: google.com/reader
• Subscribing to a blog:
• 99% of the time you can subscribe to a blog by copying the URL of a blog post you like and pasting it into the Google Reader subscription button.
• The other 1% of the time you’ll need to look for a “subscribe via RSS” link or an orange RSS symbol
• You can also put a subscribe button into your browser bar to make it very easy to subscribe from a webpage. To add a subscribe button, go to manage subscriptions (bottom of left column in reader), select goodies (top menu), scroll down to “subscribe as you surf” and drag the “subscribe” button to the browser toolbar. (if you want to rename it, just right-click/apple-click)
• To search for possible feeds, type a search term into the subscription box and Google Reader will suggest feeds for you.
• Sharing
• You can share everything
• You can share certain tags (folder names are also considered tags)
• You can share to a link blog/webpage
• You can share to a clip (which displays in a small sidebar on a webpage)
• You can follow people and they can follow you
• Organizing
• Simple folder organization
• Puts your topics together as you think (or for easy “mark read”-ing)
• Easier to scan through large volumes of information quickly – knowledge management as we use to call it.

Other Resources Mentioned in the Show:

• Kevin mentioned he uses Feeddler RSS reader for iphone and ipad  on his iphone (Robin mostly uses Google Reader in the browser on mobile devices but also uses Flipboard –great magazine style layout–and Reeder on the ipad)
• Microsoft OneNote for the desktop and Apple mobile app (note currently available for Android devices)
• Evernote available for desktop and most all mobile devices
• Book: The Filter Bubble: What the Internet Is Hiding from You by Eli Pariser

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