Articulate 360: Everything you need to know

03 Feb

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Articulate released a new authoring tool, Articulate 360, in November 2016. And while launching it, Articulate released a statement and described its newest offering as — “Everything you need for course development in one convenient subscription”.

It’s worth noting that Articulate’s other popular products, including Storyline 2 and 3 have been available to users via a perpetual license model. However, in departure from this pricing model, they offered Articulate 360 as a subscription-based service for users to renew annually.

What is Articulate 360?

Articulate 360 is essentially a suite of nine applications namely Storyline 360, Studio 360, Replay 360, Peek, Preso, Content Library, Articulate Review, Articulate Live and Rise.

Now, a subscription to Articulate 360 allows users to access the entire suite of 9 applications. This aims to provide them with a comprehensive list of authoring tools to fulfill every requirement that arises while creating an eLearning course.

Overview of the Articulate 360 Subscription

Here’s a brief overview of all nine applications included in Articulate 360 subscription:

Storyline 360 (Desktop): Storyline 360 allows you to create interactive content and responsive courses which dynamically adapt to any screen size. Its in-built player supports multiple touchscreen gestures to make it more interactive for tablets and mobile users.

With Storyline 360, you can create unlimited number of interactions. Articulate claims this new tool is “simple enough for beginners, yet powerful enough for experts.”

Moreover, compared to the recently released Storyline 3, Storyline 360 has additional features such as content library integration. It also has over 1.5 million content library photos, illustrations, icons and videos and in-built review tool called Articulate Review.

Articulate 360 — Demo of an interactive dial in ‘hand drawn style’ created with help of Storyline 360

Articulate 360 storyline — A Christmas Game created by Sponge UK using Storyline 360

Studio 360 (Desktop) is a suite of authoring apps for Windows computers. It includes:
- (i) Presenter 360, which allows you to quickly create online and presentation based courses
- (ii) Quizmaker 360 with which you can create dynamic quizzes, surveys and
- (iii) Engage 360 with the help of which users can create media-rich interactions for online courses by merely providing details in a form.
- Its brand new responsive player automatically displays when you view Studio 360 HTML5 courses on devices such as tablets and smartphones. The content adapts to size and orientation for every any mobile device.
Preso: An iPad app that lets you create informal training videos on the go. You can add text and images, import PDFs, draw annotations, record narration and highlight important content with zoom and pan gestures.
Replay 360: (Desktop) A video-recording app for creating training videos. With Replay 360, you can mix screencasts, video files, webcam videos, audio tracks and images with much ease. It also allows you to capture screen activity and give learners a tutorial through content using your webcam video.

Articulate Review: (Web based) A powerful collaborative review tool which allows you to review your courses with multiple stakeholders. Essentially, the review feature makes it possible to share feedback on the content you create via Storyline 360, Studio 360, Replay 360, Peek and Preso within one web application. Because Articulate Review is web-based, you don’t need to download it. Also, your team members can see multiple comments and reviews in one central location.
Peek: (Desktop): This helps record screencasts/screen activity and you can customize screen recording area. Its features are reportedly similar to Replay 360, however it’s lighter and easier to use. Peek allows you to upload these videos directly to ‘Articulate Review’ and by sharing a link, you can seek feedback on it from anyone.
Rise: (Web based): In addition to Storyline 360’s responsive player, Rise is solely to create responsive courses with ease. According to Articulate, they designed it to be simple and user-friendly for any designer or developer to use.

Demo course created by using ‘Articulate Rise’

Articulate Live: Articulate is well known for its online support and user communities. And by the addition of ‘Articulate Live’ to suite of applications, it takes this a step forward. This is done by weekly webinars for learning and development professionals that include presenters who are industry experts from around the world.
Content Library: There is an impressive selection of over 1.5 million images and professionally designed slide templates that are available to the subscriber via his subscription.

Pricing

The annual subscription to Articulate 360 for new users is priced at $1,199 per user. For Articulate 360 Teams, the subscription is priced at $1,499 annually. Academic discounts of approximately 50% are offered on individual and team plans.

For existing users of Articulate’s products including Storyline 2 or Studio 13, promotional discounts are available for the first year of Articulate 360’s subscriptions.

Subscribers however don’t have the option to subscribe or buy individual applications and are required to subscribe to Articulate 360 to access any of the nine applications in the suite.

At present, there is also no option to allow users to avail a monthly subscription of Articulate 360 either.

Varied reactions from users of Articulate 360

What’s not gone down well with users:

Subscription-based Price Model: The subscription-based pricing of Articulate 360 has not appealed to many of Articulate’s existing users who were accustomed to acquiring perpetual licenses for other products. Owing to this, the recurring expenditure to renew licenses annually may not be financially viable for freelance developers. This could also be a heftier burden for small businesses, independent contractors, and educational institutions.
Mac Compatibility: You can use Articulate 360 on a Mac with limited versions, but for other versions, it you need to install via third-party software such as Parallels Desktop. For loyal Mac users, the lack of a native Mac version of Articulate 360 could make it more expensive to use via third-party software. While there have been improvements in compatibility and performance, a native Mac version is still awaited.
Limitations of Rise: Despite updates, some limitations of Rise remain. It does not allow adding background images/videos, supports limited fonts, and lacks gamification features. However, recent updates have introduced enhanced list and quote blocks, and new interaction types.
Storyline 360 Responsive Features: Although the responsive features in Storyline 360 were welcomed, its functionality remains somewhat limited. It retains the same proportions and scales down to fit the size of the player, which can result in very small font sizes and difficult-to-access interactive buttons. It’s important to mention that recent updates have aimed to improve user experience. Some of which include the ability to customize closed captions and use a built-in JavaScript console for debugging.

What users really liked:

Articulate Review: New users of Articulate 360 are particularly happy with the ‘Articulate Review’ application. This feature allows instructional designers to work more seamlessly with collaborators and SMEs. Additionally, feedback can be consolidated contextually, eliminating the need for spreadsheets. Furthermorem recent updates have added more flexibility, such as allowing stakeholders to comment without needing an Articulate ID.
Articulate Rise: ‘Articulate Rise’ can produce fully responsive design courses. It also offers several pre-built lesson types and allows eLearning developers to create interactive courses rapidly. Again, developers can customize content creation using ‘blocks’ to play around with text, images, bullets, lists, accordions, and more. They can also preview how content and elements display on phones, tablets, and other devices. Moreover, recent updates have introduced new interaction types and enhanced customization options.
Storyline 360: Previous users of Storyline who have transitioned to Storyline 360 find it more intuitive, with smoother animations and transitions. Additionally, recent updates have further improved user experience, including the ability to customize closed captions and use a built-in JavaScript console for debugging.
Content Library: Users are particularly pleased with the addition of the Content Library and its integration into Storyline 360. The extensive selection available in the Content Library offers attractive templates that can be imported into Storyline 360 or Studio 360. They can also customize based on requirements. Plus, recent updates have expanded the library to include new photographic characters and templates.
Rise and Review Integration: Initially, the ‘Rise’ application could not be used alongside ‘Review’. This limited the ability to use collaborative features where stakeholders can give comments/feedback during course development. However, users can now publish their Rise 360 course to Review 360. Consequently, the reviewers can leave in-context comments, follow threaded discussions, and mark comments as resolved.

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Enhance Your Workflow: zipBoard as a Companion to Articulate Review 360

While Articulate Review 360 is a convenient tool integrated within the Articulate 360 suite, it has several limitations that might prompt you to consider alternative review tools for eLearning courses. Review 360 has:

Limited Review Features: Articulate Review 360 lacks advanced markup and annotation tools. It offers only basic commenting features, and this can be restrictive when reviewing interactive content.
No Task Management: There is no built-in task manager to enable users to prioritize comments and tasks. And this makes project management more challenging.
Size and Character Limits: Each published item in Review 360 has a maximum size limit of 5 GB, and comments are limited to 1,500 characters.
Lack of Robust Editing Tools: Users have noted the absence of advanced video editing tools and the inability to pinpoint specific specs within the content.

The opposites of the above and many others are true for zipBoard. zipBoard offers a comprehensive solution for reviewing and providing feedback on e-learning courses, including those created with Articulate Storyline.

How to Review Articulate 360 Courses in zipBoard

If you’re looking for a more robust alternative to Articulate Review 360, zipBoard addresses these limitations. It provides a more feature-rich platform for reviewing e-learning content – from SCORM files to videos, images, audios, live URLs, and more.. Here’s how you can review Articulate 360 courses in zipBoard:

1. Upload Your Course: Export your Articulate Storyline course as a SCORM package or HTML5 output and upload it as a zip file to zipBoard.

2. Invite Reviewers: Share the project with your team or stakeholders by inviting them via email or sharing a link in your preferred communication channel. Clients, SMEs, and some internal team members do not need a license to collaborate. Learn more here

3. Use Advanced Markup Tools: Reviewers can use a variety of annotation and commenting tools to give contextual feedback. These include shapes, highlighters, video recording, screenshots, text annotations, and more.

Click here to try it in the app – without signing up.

4. Manage Feedback and Tasks: Use the built-in task manager in zipBoard to manage tasks from comments and assign them to team members. You can also prioritize tasks, add tags, and track their progress in one place. With zipBoard, you don’t need to export comments into spreadsheets if you don’t want to.

5. Export Feedback: Have a dedicated task manager? You can export comments and tasks to CSV or PDF for further analysis or record-keeping. You can also import your existing tasks from other tools into zipBoard.

6. Autogenerated Reports: Easily check the progress of all digital assets under review in a specific project or across your organization in zipBoard.

How zipBoard’s Integrations Can Streamline Your eLearning Content Development Process

Integrating zipBoard with your existing tools like Jira, Wrike, Slack, and Microsoft Teams can significantly enhance your eLearning content development workflow.

With zipBoard, you can seamlessly convert feedback and annotations into Jira tickets. This centralized issue tracking and ensuring efficient management of comments and tasks.
The zipBoard – Wrike integration allows for enhanced project management by syncing tasks and feedback. This enables real-time collaboration and smooth project progression.
zipBoard’s integration with Slack provides instant notifications from zipBoard in Slack and promotes efficient communication. Consequently, this keeps your team informed and reduces the need for lengthy email threads.
Adding zipBoard as a tab in Microsoft Teams channels integrates workflows. This allows you to manage feedback and tasks directly within Teams. It also streamlines the feedback process and makes it easier to track and manage project progress.
With zipBoard’s API integrations, you can integrate with your content management systems and create custom content review workflows that suit your needs. This also prevents the manual movement of digital assets for uploads.

Final thoughts

While ‘Articulate Rise’ and ‘Articulate Review’ have received some acclaim, reservations remain over the prohibitive packaging and pricing of Articulate 360. This is more so in the case of freelancers and smaller teams who may not need the entire suite of packages and licenses but have no option but to subscribe to all the products.

Users appreciate the effort to make courses responsive and add collaborative features in Storyline. Nonetheless, the high pricing to get access to those features makes it an unconvincing transition, especially for those disinterested in other applications in the suite.

An alternative approach in such cases could be to use review tools that work with Articulate already such as zipBoard. For those not convinced to make the switch to Articulate 360, such tools provide a great option to streamline the course development process from mock up to final product.

zipBoard is review and feedback tool that makes eLearning course development simpler and faster. It is compatible with authoring tools such as Adapt, Articulate, Lectora, iSpring and Captivate. To know more, check out how zipBoard can help with eLearning.

Streamline eLearning Content Reviews with zipBoard

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Look at what our customers think about zipBoard

Beth Epperson ELM

” Implementing zipBoard into our development process has taken the team from using antiquated manual processes to an easy to use, globally accessible, online process. The application is flexible in how projects are set up and managed. zipBoards environment allows multiple projects to be set up and managed uniquely; where other tools force a specific method for everything. “

Beth Epperson

QA Manager - ELM Learning

” The overall value comes from efficiently gathering feedback from our quality assurance team and any other stakeholders. This is very important because we want to ensure quality but at the same time, if we had to collect the feedback in another way and coalesce them, this would take time and effort that zipBoard makes easy for us. So it’s very valuable. “

John Just

KnowBe4’s Senior VP of Learning Innovation

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TAGS : Articulate 360 Authoring Tools collaboration elearning eLearning authoring tools eLearning Content Development Process

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