Today I'm going to look at avatars. An avatar is basically a graphical representation of a user (usually) and is meant to make the computer environment a more friendly place. Software such as Site Pal can be used to customise a virtual person that sits on your site or program and basically says what you want it to. It can be used to guide, greet and generally help a user along. Simon in our office has already customised a trial version of a virtual "Abby" which even has my voice on it...spooky, but I think you'll agree that it could be quite an effective support tool. Plus if the user does have to call in for help, they will have a voice that they recognise on the end of the phone. I'll put the link on here later today so that you can have a look at it.

You can even use an avatar to provide support via a mobile device; have a look at this demo of codebaby: www.codebaby.com You can also view a macromedia breeze presentation of a case study of a company called Fountain Tire who used avatars in their elearning; click here to access the case study This presentation is really interesting as it also talks about the strategy of setting up elearning content, an LMS and talks about operational issues that the company faced. Check out one of the courses they created:fountain tire elearning demo using avatars from codebaby