Content Assistant

By: Christopher Robison

In this weeks class we discussed multiple websites to find documents pertaining to our professions. In using these websites, we were able to add current articles to our own websites and twitter profiles. Before learning about these useful websites, I was stuck finding the information on my own and tweeting about it with hashtags and it was all quite a hassle to do everyday. These websites are incredibly easy to use and are a great help in creating my professional learning network (PLN).

The first website discussed was Flipboard, which "takes stories from around the web based on your own interests and delivers them to you in an attractive visual feed." Setting up your Flipboard is super easy and allows you to sign up using either email or via Facebook. Once you've created your profile, just simply pick your topics of interest and you'll be updated by news articles only related to those topics everyday. After all of the beginning steps are completed, you can mess with your content and fully create your own Flipboard magazine.

Another website that was brought up in class was Paper.li, which is used to achieve the same tasks as Flipboard, however has more sharing capabilities. Paper.li is a content curation tool that lets individuals create 'newspapers' based on topics they choose and “Automatically find, publish & promote engaging articles, photos and videos from across the web.” Creating your own shareable newspaper is just a few clicks away with this website. What makes Paper.li stand out from other websites of its kind is that you can share your newspaper with ease on multiple social media accounts. Paper.li automatically sends out a copy of your newspaper to your social media as often as you would like. Best of all, whenever an article on your paper is posted, it automatically adds fitting hashtags and the Twitter handles of the author(s) of the article. A tool like this could come in handy for any business that strives to be a topic leader.

An article by Tim Lenahan describes how easy it is to own and publish your own online newspaper using Paper.li. Sites such as Flipboard already have built-in sources that bring in the articles whereas Paper.li allows you to pick your own content sources. These sources can range from youtube channels to twitter hashtags and everything in between including RSS feed from virtually any news source. Just remember to keep the content sources specific to your profession and Paper.li will do the rest.

In another article by Jay Palter, he talks about how Paper.li has helped him add value, promote influencers and build personal brand. The killer feature of Paper.li is that you can configure this tool to automatically post a daily Tweet to your account mentioning the Twitter users that are featured on your Paper.li page. By adding the users that are featured in the article you post, they are personally able to see your post and anyone that follows you is able to see it too. This feature enables anyone to connect with your profile including the people you mention in each article posted everyday.

The final website we talked about in class was Microsoft OneNote and is used as your own organized digital notebook. With this useful tool, you can type, write/sketch, or audio record all of your notes. The use of folders and sections makes all of your notes easily accessible and shareable with anyone you choose to be edited. When using OneNote, you might notice the search bar in the top right corner and this is used to search all of your folders if you need to find a specific note. Just as you can write or sketch notes you can also search this way and it will mostly always know exactly what you mean as long as your handwriting is somewhat legible.

Seeing that I am a computer science major, I found this next article by Joel Lee to be very interesting. The article titled "7 Best Note-Taking Tools for Programmers" is about, well, note-taking tools for programmers which I've actually started using and they have helped me immensely with keeping my programs organized. One of the best tools mentioned was Microsoft OneNote which until recently was completely useless to programmers. Now, thanks to a free add-on released by a GitHub user, OneNote can now do Syntax highlighting for code.

In this weeks reading of 'LOL...OMG', we read about how permanent the internet really is. Virtually anything that you post online is going to be there forever, somewhere. Whether it is downloaded by any random user or snapshotted by archive.org, your content can be found somewhere. This brings up the issue of any future you long to have. If you apply to college,  if you want to join the military, if you want to be hired by a company in your field, someone will look at your online record.  Although people have the freedom of speech, it is important to remain cautious about what you say on the internet. A UCLA student who showed racism against Asians has received backlash and even death threats for her offensive comments. It not only affected her but her family as well as they also received some harassment. It is important to think about what you say before posting something in order to protect your online reputation.