The first time I reviewed Backboard in May it was a simple website through which you could post a document and have people leave feedback for you in a message board or comment system style. It was easy to use and free so I thought it had potential as online resource for conducting peer-review of documents. Yesterday, I received an email informing me of some updates to Backboard that make it a better product.

Backboard has recently added the capability for real-time commenting within a document which is an improvement over the previous system. Backboard now has a full-screen mode and a resizing option to allow you to work with images of almost any size. Speaking of images, Backboard now supports the inclusion of vector graphics. Finally, Backboard offers RSS feeds for your documents so that you can track comments in your favorite RSS reader.

Applications for Education
Backboard is a quick and easy way for students and teachers to peer-review documents. To upload a document, you need to create an account, but to comment you do not. So if you want to have students comment on an article or on an image you can have the class writing comments very quickly.