The eLN has added a number of new categories to the eLearning Awards for 2008. These reflect the wide range of ways in which elearning is now applied. They also provide the chance for internal and external teams to be recognised for their efforts over the year. The new categories are:

1. The best use of rapid elearning content
2. The best use of synchronous elearning
3. The best online distance learning programme
4. The best learning game, simulation or virtual environment
5. Elearning internal project team of the year

The eLearning Guild's latest report on authoring and development tools shows just how dominant Adobe have become, at least in the US market. Just look at these results, showing the market share of tools in various categories:

• Rapid development tools: #1 Captivate (65% of Guild members); #4 Presenter (26%)
• Courseware authoring, i.e. more serious tools: #1 Captivate (60%); #2 Flash (47%); #3 Dreamweaver (43%); #5 Authorware (16%).
• Simulation tools: #1 Captivate (79%); #2 Flash (45%).
• Audio recording (!!!!): #1 Captivate (44%).

As you're now witnessing, the eLN has a new website and a new look. We've been working hard over the past month to get this new site up and running for launch at Learning Technologies 2008. Over the next few weeks, we're going to be populating the site with all sorts of useful elearning resources, but the real purpose of this new site is social networking.