Just What Is An Unconference & How Do I Host One?

I have yet to attend one of these, but I really would love to see one in action. (Still need to find that $million I misplaced so I can fly around to all the events I'd like to attend) Anyway...I followed this link via Stephen Downs of Ewan McIntosh's 10 Top Tips for Unplanning the Perfect Unconference. It's a great posting with great tips about hosting an unconference, but what I also like about it is that the tips are ones we can/should all follow for any event we are hosting.

The very first one is so simple and easy to accomplish. It's one of those, "Why didn't I think of that?" I recently just had a management retreat here at work and the feedback about playing music over the lunch hour was incredible. "It created such a fun and lively environment." "It felt like a real break in the day and like I truly was away from the office." Honestly, can you imagine how hard was it for me to put a cd on during lunch.

I love #6 too. It's like a (what we call here) a "parking lot" of ideas. Why not let people play with their Blackberries during these conference and add thoughts, ideas, questions to the topic at hand.

The whole thing is just a great little read.

Yuxt - Video Bookmarking

Okay, maybe you've seen this, but I thought it was cool. I came across today via David Airey's blog. I was looking at an example of typography videos that he was sharing. Then my train of thought went to what is there on elearning. Saw Mr. Stephen Downs. Then I tried Tony Karrer (no videos there yet of him). Tried Web 2.0. Then for some reason I went to Star Wars. That got me a great little Lego piece and a Monty Python meshed with Star Wars. And then I stopped as my train of thought was just getting weird.

If you want to see the bookmarking tool in action here is the link to this small collection O created today. It took me literally only 3 or 4 minutes to setup and create. Seems like a great resource tool to collect and share clips of with others. The key here though is the collecting.

http://yuxt.com/hamtra/hamt

Headlines That Got Me To Read More

Well a week off for me a short bit ago and catching up on emails, voicemail, meetings and life has put me a bit behind with reading my feeds. I thought since I am behind and some items I'll just post some of the headlines/links that I found interesting from the last 2 weeks.

Laser Printers a Health Risk? - Discovery
Finding a Use for Facebook - Wendy Wickham
Free eSeminar: eLearning and the Science of Instruction - B. J. Shone
In Box Zero - 43 Folders - Increase your personal productivity - Brent Schlenker
31 Days to A Better Blog - Cammy Bean
Booos and Yeahs - Coming Back By Popular Demand - Common Craft (made me laugh - yeah!)
Bebo helps student bloggers! - Judy O'Connell
Memes - why do we do them? - Karen Romeis
Search Mash-Ups - Mike Qaissaunee
Email a New Reader of Your Blog - Nancy White
Study: Food in McDonald's Wrapper Tastes Better to Kids - Stephen Downs (I heard this on the radio and thought - yep, makes sense)
LEGO turns 75 - MAKE Magazine
Egypt's Largest Pharaoh-Era Fortress Discovered, Experts Announce - National Geographic