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Abstract: It goes by many names:
Web 2.0, the social web, and the semantic web. Call it
what you will, but the web of today is dramatically different
then the web of two years ago. With the rise of blogs,
social networking, podcasts and more the web is shifting
to a more user-centric model, where regular users are
the content creators and the contributors. The web today
is about forming communities and sharing expertise. With
new sites like Flickr, MySpace and Digg and tools like
Del.icio.us and Newsvine comes the need to search and
organize all the various forms of information and media
into a usable form and more importantly, make it user-friendly.
Enter meta-search tools. They do the heavy lifting of
gathering relevant data from across the web and organizing
it into easy-to-digest chunks. Staff and students at
Allegheny College developed one such engine, Gnosh, which
is quickly gaining users around the world. What started
as a fun, after hours project has developed into a fledgling
company that is developing new search tools including
a federated search tool for libraries.
Mike Richwalsky, creator of Gnosh and Manager of Web
Services at Allegheny College, will speak about the genesis,
development and growth of Gnosh as well as its impact
on libraries and the web ( and Web 2.0) in general.
Speaker Bio : Mike Richwalsky is the
Manager of Web Services at Allegheny College in Meadville,
PA. Since 2002, he has led Allegheny into the forefront
of colleges and universities using new technologies including
RSS, podcasts, MySpace and more. He is also the creator
of the award-winning meta-search engine, Gnosh where
he serves as Gnosh’s President and CEO.
Mike received his B.A. from Duquesne University, where
he developed the University’s website, web-based
applications and was the main technical
support liaison for faculty using WebCT. He has also
led development and design efforts at Stargate and Fishtank
Creative.
In addition to his work at Allegheny, Mike recently
served as chair of the Web and Technology Track of HigherEd
BlogCon, an online conference presented by Thomson Peterson's,
PRNewsWire, ProfNet, and the Council for Advancement
and Support of Education (CASE). He presented at the
Spring 2006 task force meeting of CNI, and is involved
with the social software user group sponsored by the
National Institute for Technology and Liberal Education
(NITLE).
Mike has been featured in recent articles in the Christian
Science Monitor, University Business magazine and the
Chronicle of Higher Education’s Wired Campus blog. He
has won several local and national awards, including
a 2003 Erie Ad Club award for Allegheny's Centerstage
Series email campaign. His previous awards include a
Macromedia national site of the day award, a Yahoo! Pick
of the Day award and several Erie Ad Club awards. Most
recently, he Gnosh poster was named “Best Poster
Session” at HighEdWebDev 2005.
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