Blackboard NG Intro Video

I'm not sure how long ago this "sneak peek" was posted to Blackboard's website, but take a look at this intro video:
http://www.blackboard.com/projectNG/

Does it remind you of any other intros you've seen?  Okay so they ripped off Apple, but I can't blame them for copying the greatest marketers in the IT world.  I doubt we'll see any Blackboard logos on the backs of Honda Elements and Smart Cars any time soon, but trying to be friendlier looking is a good direction for them in general considering the lack of any real support videos, tutorials or any other materials for the last 2 years.

Some interesting points in the video to highlight. 

1. its got some AJAX magic sprinkled in, which is nice.  Dragging and dropping is always easier than a series of clicks and choices (there's my UX adage for the day). 
   
2. chapter 3 talks about the dashboard - and they mention the Moodle/Sakai tie-ins.  This is compelling for a few reasons I suppose, but to me the most important idea here for NCSU is the idea of a centralized point-of-entry for finding all of your online classes in one place.  Right now a student takes online classes in Blackboard Vista, Moodle, WolfWare, WebAssign, Unity space, etc.
   
3. instructor dashboard is kind of intriguing, what with the student performance monitoring page
4. looking at  it as a whole, and particularly chapter 5, "NG" looks more like "traditional" Blackboard than "Vista" (formerly WebCT Vista).  I see the WebCT View option, and that helps, but it's still clearly more on the traditional side.

Anyway, the video is worth taking a look at for all of you following the LMS saga.



-Charlie

Posted by cdmorris ( Aug 20 2008, 08:11:29 AM EDT ) Permalink Comments [1]