What if you don’t have the time, the venue, or the people to run through some practice presentations in person? I’ve been trying out a free online tool that might help. It’s called Elluminate, an e-learning system used by a lot of academics to do virtual collaboration and teaching. Here’s a screenshot:

Now of course you could load up your presentation materials on a place like SlideShare and get feedback, but what I like about Elluminate is that it’s live, with audio and video, so you can get immediate feedback and even try changing things in real time. Then there’s the application sharing, the desktop display functions, and lots more.

Best of all, there’s a simple version of the system which is free, allowing up to three people to join you for a mini-roundtable.