Here I was going on and on about how great Evoca is, and our colleague at Cybergogy has been using Odeo since January to send out sung parts to his chorus so they can learn by listening and imitating. Odeo is one of the front-runners in the web recording and file sharing. Others in the field include Springdoo, WaxMail and my latest personal favorite, YackPack, which is designed to bring groups together for yacking (what else?)
The idea of connecting with others by using your voice brings an asynchronous quality to the concept of live chat sessions, using the voice to communicate because of the additional layers of meaning that come with the spoken word. The concept is extremely easy. All you need is a microphone or your telephone, and you are in business. Sound files are kept on the server and you can e-mail the files immediately to one or more parties as well as designate whether they can be heard by the public or only by the group.
Some of the services are in it for the money (!!), but nearly all have some free version or a free introductory trial period. If you use your imagination, you can begin to dream how such a service may add to pedagogical tools, but also what features you might want to make it an more effective educational tool. Musicians are using it as a convenient way to transmit examples and maintaining files on a server instead of your computer hard drive.
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