Skype is an awesome tool. I have been using it almost daily for the past 4 years to talk with parents who live in Chicago. It was a god-send when we first discovered it, because we all missed each other so much!
I was very interested in the article about using Skype to video chat with an author of a book the students were studying. Last year, we had an author visit our school. He did a presentation in front of the whole school, read to the students, and talked about the process of writing his book. It was great.....except no one could hear or see him clearly. There were over 200 children in the gym! I felt the message in his book was lost, and so was the value of having the author actually visit. Perhaps if we could set up a video conference with the author and have a few classes tune in at a time. This way, they would be able to interact a lot better.
Mikogo is a collaborative tool for sharing your screen with people who all log into the same cyber meeting place. It would be great to lead a professional development using this tool! For me, it would reduce my anxiety of having to speak in front of an audience, and the attendees can log in from home.....in their PJ's if they want!
My family and I have also used Skype to communicate with each other, and like you, we all were so glad when we found this program. I also read the article about using Skype for author visits, and I thought it was a great idea. I am glad you shared your experience because it is good to know that this works best in smaller gatherings.
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