Storybird is a website for those looking more on the side of improving their writing skills rather than just posting what they have created. The site offers prompts and courses that will help you turn that white paper into black and white. Although it seems to be directed more towards the younger crowd it doesn't limit you too much.
When you are ready to start writing, it gives you many different starts including starting with a picture, a challenge (Prompt), or if you are really struggling, it will give you a "how to start writing" or a course to teach you some techniques or ways to solve the problems you are having. A problem I saw when looking through all the site offers, I noticed when you start writing, the only way to have pictures is if you take one from the website. You can't upload your own from what I've seen. Another issue is with those who decide to do poetry. You are given a word bank instead of a text box. You then drag and drop words from the word bank onto a picture that you chose. That part is very limiting. I would give this tool a 2/5. If you are there to learn or write long novels, you are given all the tools necessary to do that. However, if you are there for poetry or art books/picture books, you may feel very limited on your creative freedom. To check out this tool for yourself: https://storybird.com/
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This cute little site is exactly what it says. Post stories in six words! This site is useful for those who have a hard time getting started with writing. There are many prompts to use and many posts from others that may help spark an idea. Once you get those six words down, it gives you a place to write the meaning or "backstory" which allows you to even more get a start with your writing. There are competitions and even a blog on the site. It is very useful as a tool to get you started in the writing world and also useful to get your work out there since everything you post is not private. People can comment on your works and share it.
I will give this tool a 5 out of 5. It is cute and simple to use while helping push people to start writing, even if it is just six words. Check it out yourself at: https://www.sixwordmemoirs.com/ Quotev is another web 2.0 tool for creative people. It caters more to those in fandoms but can be used by anyone. You're able to create stories, quizes, and polls or surveys. The thing that makes this stand out to me, is that you can add editors for your story. Which is someone who can go in and make changes to your story if you allow them. This makes it easy to collaborate or just make sure your spelling is correct.
I would give this tool a 4 out of 5, do to how I just don't use it much myself however it offers so much for those who do. To check Quotev out for yourself: https://www.quotev.com/ Get Underlined is another tool to discover and create stories. However, it offers a bit more than the other sites. Along with stories, it offers videos, quizzes, and events. Underlined is slightly more sophisticated than the other sites. To post your story, it has to go under review ahead of time instead of being instantly available. Most may get turned off by this however it makes the quality of stories to discover a lot better. A problem I see with it is the style of the create system. It is extremely different than other sites. Instead of clicking on the chapter you would like to work with and going to its own page, you are brought to a page that show cases all the chapters in their entirety which can look and feel very confusing if you're not use to it. However, its a very beautiful looking site, and very powerful. I will give this tool a 3/5 because of it's confusing create system and how long it takes for your story to actually get published. Even if its not the best, it's still very neat. Check it out for yourself at: https://www.getunderlined.com/ Webtoon is an amazing tool for posting and reading web comics. There's not so much tools for creation however it allows you to upload your works to share. I mentioned this website in my last review for it's great discover page. Getting known on the sight is simple. Once you post you almost instantly have people subscribing or commenting on your episode. Anyone can upload a comic so there is such a wide variety of content to read. The sight also hold competitions that anyone can participate in as long as it falls under the rules of the challenge.
Webtoon is a very fun tool and would definitely give it 5/5. You can check it out for yourself at www.webtoon.com Wattpad is a free to use website that allows you to create and share your own novels. It was released in 2006 and remains, in my opinion, one of the easiest to use create systems. It allows you to write and add pictures or videos to enhance the reading experience with ease. However, it's downfall is in it's sharing feature. The website promotes big, award winning books while the normal, small writers like myself get pushed back making it hard to be noticed. To illustrate my point, another style website, Webtoon allows users to post comics rather than novels. It offers a discover page similar to a blog where the newest post is on top. This gains you instant support and feed back from other users. Wattpad however goes off of key words in the title making other books pop up before yours. I would rate Wattpad a 5 out of 5 if it's sharing system was better. However until that's fixed I have to give it a 3 out of 5. You can explore this tool at www.wattpad.com This blog will be used for my Web 2.0 class. I will be posting reviews of different Web 2.0 tools.
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AuthorA student posting reviews every other week for their Web 2.0 class. Archives
December 2018
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