Horizon Wimba, a provider of collaboration tools and software applications to the online education market, has released Wimba Voice Tools version 5.1, which includes two new voice tools – the Wimba Podcaster and the Wimba Voice Presentation Tool.

Wimba Podcaster is designed to make it easy for teachers to add audio files to their online courses so that students can subscribe to them as podcasts. To subscribe, a student clicks a single button on the Wimba Podcaster interface to sign up for the podcasts in iTunes or other podcast-ready software.

Wimba Podcaster will also allow audio that has been recorded outside of the Wimba Voice Tools – such as a recording of a lesson, interview, or music file – to be distributed as a podcast.

“Creating a podcaster was a no-brainer,” said Tommaso Trionfi, CEO of Horizon Wimba. “iPods have become so universal that it made perfect sense for us to make our Wimba Voice Tools compatible with them, and as podcasting grows in popularity, we want to ensure that our software helps faculty easily create podcasts in their online courses. This is a natural fit.”

Wimba Voice Tools version 5.1 currently integrates with the Blackboard Learning System 6.0+. WebCT Campus Edition 6.0 / Vista 4.0 integration will be available soon.