Free File Converter for Mac and Other Things You Might Want to Know about YouTube

Recently I tried to organize and curate my YouTube channel to better effect. My first problem was that as an inveterate Mac user, most of the videos on my desktop were in .MOV format, and even though this was purportedly a YouTube-supported format, I could not seem to upload some of my videos.

Some of the most popular video formats supported by YouTube (directly from their Help site:

• WebM files--Vp8 video codec and Vorbis Audio codecs
• .MPEG4, 3GPP and MOV files--Typically supporting h264, mpeg4 video codecs, and AAC audio codec
• .AVI--Many cameras output this format--typically the video codec is MJPEG and audio is PCM
• .MPEGPS--Typically supporting MPEG2 video codec and MP2 audio
• .WMV
• .FLV--Adobe-FLV1 video codec, MP3 audio

The only error message on the YouTube upload page was something to the effect that "There is a problem with your file."  After much trial and error, here are some things I learned about video file formats and YouTube.

 Believing the .MOV file format might be the problem, I tried about half a dozen free video converter software apps on my long video. None of them would convert a video of any length for free, despite plastering the word "free" all over their download sites. 100 MB is about the limit without paying extra, including online converters. I finally came across QTAmateur.app at the Mac Update site. Despite the dopey name, this little software is very powerful and converts to many different video formats quite easily, including those usable by PCs and mobile devices. And it is an absolutely free download. Use ("Export" to make the conversion.)

This was a fortunate find, as I want my videos to eventually be playable on mobile devices as well as on desktops.

I still had a problem, in that YouTube kept saying something was wrong with one particular file, even though it was quite small when converted to mpeg4. It turns out that YouTube goes by time, not file size, and allows only 15-minutes maximum play time. However, when you verify your account using a mobile phone number, Google will send you a text code that gives you up to 2-hour lengths. YouTube is very non-informative about this fact, and it probably relates to an improvement resulting from Google taking over YT. Maybe the help pages and links will be improved in the coming months.

I found the information about how to get the extra size files (the link didn't just jump out at me) by searching videos in YouTube (of course). I found several, the best and simplest of which, I think, is How to Increase Your Upload Limit on YouTube.

With an officially "verified" account and armed with the increased upload limit, I got my video up. See The Effects of Technology on SLA, a talk I gave at TESOL New York, 2008, in either .avi format (a little clearer, below) or .mpeg4 at my YouTube channel. Just FYI, this was originally a Powerpoint slideshow saved as a Powerpoint movie.  I may yet get around to putting the .mov version up, but you can play it with most video players on most platforms anyway.

The Bases for a Personal Learning Network

These are excerpts from a Kim Cofino fireside talk at WorldBridges, as edited by Vance Stevens.

Her main points form the basis for a Personal Learning Network--what every teacher really needs in the Digital Age:

Tools
- RSS feed - find out what other professionals are thinking about and stay up to date
- Join an education social network - learn and share with other teachers
- Start a blog - express yourself and monitor your own growth as a professional
- Use Skype to share and connect with other professionals
- Attend online conferences - both synchronously and asynchronously [WorldBridges is a good place to catch up and get into conferences]
- Use Twitter - find professionals and make connections [Vance's own anecdotes are clear illustrations of how useful this can be]
- Design global online interactions for your students [e.g., iEarn, GLOBE, or your own class-to-class project]

Attitudes
- Be more flexible and try out more collaborative approaches
- Allow for student-led processes, and learning from peers
- Learn, create, and share with your students
- Use the Internet to let your students connect with other students--and teachers--around the world
- Students in developing countries already have "global attitudes" - multicultural and multilingual perspectives, so take advantage of these

Archival Video Sites

Both OurMedia and the Internet Archive are unbelievably slow and have made their interfaces much more difficult to use. OurMedia just transferred my video to a new address without telling me, and I can't find it at all on the Internet Archive. In OurMedia, a search for tags and for titles and for owner--none of them--didn't come up with the video, but it was still there. Go figure!

I also tried to edit the description in OurMedia to include the Web address of the wiki that also contains the presentation, but with no luck. I was asked to join a group before I could edit my own work--couldn't find any with "education" through the search engine, though I could see a few with that word in the title from a list. I then was told I hadn't completed the CSID (the test of human user), but that box wasn't available at the page where I was doing the editing. No win!

I hope to get the video from the 2008 TESOL presentation embedded here in the blog below. We'll see how long it lasts as a real link!

The address is now http://www.ourmedia.org/node/88432



Another video archive site, AuthorStream is also very slow. My presentation there (no audio) is at
http://www.authorstream.com/Presentation/ElizabethHS-224813-effect-tech-sla-entertainment-ppt-powerpoint/. The sound version apparently has just vanished or was never accepted as an unload because it was too large or the wrong format.

Blip.tv still has the presentation, and seemed to load about the fastest. Unfortunately, it's not a place to take the children...

These sites are very frustrating, and I'm glad I uploaded the presentation to multiple venues. With the economic downturn in 2009, there has been a lot of moving and shaking, and I think there will be more changes in store in early 2010.

Learning Spanish Online

Since I am trying to brush up on my Spanish, I was lucky to find the Webheads are also interested in the subject. Turns out there are a number of places to get at learning a language online. Here is a compendium of places to learn Spanish online from the Webheads e-list:

---

Spanish proficiency exercises on video:
http://www.laits.utexas.edu/spe/siteindex.php
and again from Twitter, here's a student of Spanish who blogs/twitters abou his learning: http://www.spanish-only.com/
--Graham Stanley

---

Netlanguages.com
--Gavin Dudeney

---

What started out as a fundraiser for a good cause through a series of podcasts back in 2006, has developed into an online Spanish language school for Ben and Maria, the British/Spanish couple that started it: Notes in Spanish
--Jane Petring

---

Have you looked at the BBC Spanish courses and resources? Some great stuff here:
http://www.bbc.co.uk/languages/spanish/
--Johanna Stirling

---

I am really enjoying Babbel.com.

There are sets of typical exercises, but done in a more imaginative
way than the usual drill-and-grill. Also, when you enter the site
there are short movies with a brief writing assignment. You write in
Spanish and send it to "Community" or "Friends" (once you get some).
They correct your Spanish, and you correct their English version in
tandem learning. I have since starting acquired about a half dozen
friends who correspond with me at the level I am capable of. It's
really Community Language Learning. So after studying the
Introductions exercises, I wrote a letter of introduction to send to
my Spanish-speaking Friends list.

Also Babbel has just added a chat function to have live meetings with
Friends--I haven't set one up yet, as I've been traveling. And one of
the people on my Friends list has requested a Skype conference. So
it's fun and very encouraging. You can start with beginning lessons or
select intermediate or advanced. I think it is already helping my
facility in the language. It is motivating to see what Friends are doing.

[And they don't seem to care that I am a 66-yr old grandma.]
--Elizabeth HS

---

I'd recommend Live Mocha.
Haven't been there in a while, but all this conversation has gotten me excited again to practice Spanish!
--Carla Arena

---

If you are looking to learn with a real online tutor you could
explore Speakshop.com.

Most of the tutors are based in South America and the project is set
up under a kind of 'fair trade ' model. The site acts as an agency
that trains and helps to equip teachers in poorer countries so that
they can earn money online internationally. You can find out a bit
more about the project here:
http://speakshop.com/06_aboutus

And the tutors here:
http://speakshop.com/02_tutors

--Nik Peachey

---

Join http://ar.groups.yahoo.com/ group/idioma-espagnol/. There are some interesting LINKS to practise the language.
--Nelba

Nelba is also organizing free Spanish sessions in Second Life. [address to follow]

I'll come back and re-edit this if more spots appear on the list, or I run across any further. I have been very negligent of my Babbel Friends, as the site was not very responsive when I was traveling--kept getting stuck in the exercises. This shouldn't happen.

Nik Peachey's Technology Blogs

Today I had a chance to explore Nik's blogs in more depth. These are very rich because he indicates ways to use the technology with students and/or for teacher training. Following through with each of his blog entries is like a full course in IT for teachers.

His two blogs are

Quick Shout

and the more cumbersomely named

Learning technology teacher development blog for ELT

Enjoy!

Oddcast TTS

Text-to-speech (TTS) might be a great way for students to hear what they are trying to say. SitePal now has a version of TTS that sounds pretty authentic. Try it out at
Oddcast.

Dipity

Dipity has an easy Google-type interface that allows you to create a timeline. This is an example from Michael Coughlan's Life.

Other Webheads have suggested using the interface in a jig-saw activity, where groups of students can add the info they collect as they read or research. You can add info/pix from other sites, such as Twitter and Flickr.

AuthorStream

Authorstream is an interesting way to quickly get your PowerPoint presentation online--without going through the fuss of saving it as html, and then mounting all the pages and files to a Web page.

I created a wiki for my presentation at TESOL on CALL and SLA research, copied it to PowerPoint slides, and then uploaded the resulting ppt to my Authorstream page. If there were video or audio attached, AuthorStream would convert the file to a YouTube format. Mine is just a slideshow.

UPDATE: Thanks to all who visited the slideshow. I now have the audio uploaded to both AuthorStream and Ourmedia.org.