Web 2.0 Masquerading as Web 1.0 (interesting del.icio.us interface)

I just ran into the site German GROW, a site with cultural links for German teachers at http://www.aatg.org/content/view/255/ It’s run by the AATG (American Association of German Teachers).

Like the icons? It looks very Web 1.0. But click each link and it actually takes you to a del.icio.us page that the AATG has set up. For instance the Musik link goes to http://del.icio.us/GermanGROW/Musik As you can see, the AATG has established their own folders within del.icio.us.

This is an interesting design which I like because the interface is intuitive to a Web 1.0 educator audience, but actually leverages Web 2.0 technology. If you do understand del.icio.us, you can go directly to http://del.icio.us/GermanGROW/ and even suck in the RSS feed. You can even add your own resources if you know how to tag.

But if you haven’t had a chance to get acquainted with tagging yet (and many instructors are still in this position), the Web 1.0 interface will still let you get to that content without learning a new set of terms. As my colleague Tim Perry noted recently, “RSS remains an elusive concept.”

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