Third Goal
Third Goal this community blog offers stories of Peace Corps volunteers, allowing them to share their personal experiences.
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March 31, 2005
March 30, 2005
Online Games
Addicting Games is a collection of free online games in Flash and Java.
March 29, 2005
Brainboost
Brainboost Answer Engine offers answers to questions asked in normal English. Ask it Why is the sky blue and you actually get the direct answer to the question. Ask Jeeves has the same type of search, but this one seems to return even better results. Very nice.
March 28, 2005
OurMedia
Ourmedia is a site that offers free storage and bandwidth for video, audio, photos, text and software in an effort to promote grassroots media. You can view other people's entries or offer your own.
March 27, 2005
Reader Privacy
Section 215 of the Patriot Act eliminated protections for reader privacy in libraries and bookstores. It is scheduled to expire on December 21st this year. Campaign For Reader Privacy asks you to sign the petition for reader privacy. Once you sign it, you have the option of sending related email to your Senators and Representative.
March 26, 2005
American Religion Data Archive
ARDA provides data on American religion. You can view the data by state or national maps or read membership reports by county, metro area, state or the nation as a whole.
March 25, 2005
Small Libraries & Tech
WebJunction offers the "Technology Watch List for Small Libraries." The list is a good one, featuring wireless access, blogging, virtual reference, e-books, and hassle-free browsing. The only one I have doubts about is thin-client technology. I am not sure for a small library that it will honestly save time and effort to be managing a server rather than PCs.
March 24, 2005
Acronyms
Acronym Finder is a handy site to use when you need to find out what an acronym, abbreviation or set of initials stand for. Their database includes over 400,000 definitions.
March 23, 2005
IceRocket
IceRocket Web search is a site that offers an easy-to-use search engine. It can search the Web, blogs, news, phone pics, images, and multimedia. Interestingly, they also offer a free RSS Builder for websites. I like that the focus seems to be on offering access to not just the web but also blogs.
March 22, 2005
Journals of Lewis and Clark
The Journals of the Lewis and Clark Expedition allows you to read the the actual journals kept by Lewis and Clark. New entries are being added to the collection every month, so continue to visit. You can also read selected additional texts as well as listening to selected passages read aloud.
March 21, 2005
Turbo10
Turbo10 Search Engine is a meta search engine that searches over 700 Deep Net engines. The Deep Net are sites that have content normally missed by search engines. Deep Net engines are designed to search and index those hidden areas.
March 20, 2005
Exalead
Exalead is a European-based search engine that offers some very robust features in their advanced search. Advanced options include language choice, country, file format, specific domain or site, type of search, modification date, and sorting by relevance or newness.
March 19, 2005
Factbites
Factbites is the search engine to turn to when you are doing an encyclopedia-type search. For example, if you want information on a country, an animal, a general topic, this is the site for you. To better understand, take a look at their Factbites vs Google section.
March 18, 2005
Amaztype
amaztype interfaces with Amazon to create a font built from books gathered from an Amazon search. So if you put in an author like John Grisham as the search, his name will be written in a font built from his book covers. Each book cover is then clickable and starts an actual Amazon search for that title. Confused? You really have to see it to get it.
March 17, 2005
Mover, Shaker and Juggler
Library Journal released their list of movers and shakers and I am proud to find a kindred spirit on the list: Doing It All--Michael Sullivan. Michael is a small-town librarian who enjoys doing it all, meaning that he does collection development, children's work, programming, network admin, and a lot more. Hallelujah! And congratulations to Michael for being selected and a mover, shaker and juggler.
NY Public Library Digital Gallery
The New York Public Library shows all of us how digital works should be presented and handled online with thier NYPL Digital Gallery. Featuring "free and open online access to hundreds of thousands of digital images," the site is easily browsed and searched.
March 16, 2005
Animation Site
Animation Insider is a resource page for animation, manga, graphic novel, and comic news and reviews. The site offers forums as well as an RSS feed.
March 15, 2005
Best Small Library
Library Journal - The Library Haines Built--Best Small Library in America 2005
The Haines Borough Public Library in Haines, Alaska has been selected as the Best Small Library in America 2005. Even if you are not a small library director, you can appreciate the beauty and depth of this library's story. Congratulations to such a deserving library!
WiseNut
WiseNut is a search engine with a couple of nice features. One is a simplified advanced search page that translates Boolean search terms into an easy to use format. The second is that once you run a search, the engine lists categories that some of the top results fall into. It is an unobtrusive but very useful way to make a general search even more specific.
March 14, 2005
Television Site
the futon critic is a great resource for television information. It offers news and press releases. But more importantly, it lists canceled series, what has been renewed through next season, what is in development, and premiere dates for new shows. Anyone who has searched Google for that information will know how nice it is to have it in one place.
March 13, 2005
LibraryPOP
LibraryPOP is a necessary blog for any librarian doing collection development in movies and music. They offer lists of the top DVD and CD recommendations for libraries, plus music and film news. RSS feed available.
March 12, 2005
Wireless Library Changes
Wireless Librarian is changing the way that it will be adding new libraries with wireless. Because wireless access is becoming so commonplace, Bill can no longer keep up with adding libraries. He is considering moving to a wiki where libraries would post themselves.
What a wonderful problem to have! Too many libraries offering wireless! Hurrah! And how great it is that our patrons will begin to expect wireless rather than be pleasantly surprised (even shocked) when we announce that they can connect that way. I just love it when technology is adopted so thoroughly and consistently. Wonderful!
March 11, 2005
LAMA's Small Library Collection
LAMA, the Library Administration and Management Association has made some of its Small Libraries Publications Series available online. Scroll down past the out-of-print titles and look for the blue ones. They are all available online. Topics include reference service, knowing your community, nonprint resources, automation, teen services, and volunteers, all from a small library perspective.
March 10, 2005
Censorship
Banned Book & Censorship Resources is a website that offers online resources all about censorship. From book banning to other media to U.S. Law, this site covers it all and offers a wide range of resources.
March 9, 2005
Independent Games Site
DIY Games is a blog that offers news, feature articles, reviews, and previews of independently released games.
March 8, 2005
prognosticate is a very cool game that I wish I was better at. You choose a news topic and then a news article and try to guess what word comes next in the article. Sound simple? The concept is, but the game is challenging even at easy level.
March 7, 2005
MyBlogLog
MyBlogLog is a great free way to keep track of what links people are clicking on in your blog. There is a free level or a professional level that is $3 a month or $25 a year. I have been using it for a week now and the results have been surprising and very interesting.
March 6, 2005
Meeting Scheduling Online
Meet-O-Matic: The World's Simplest Meeting Scheduler says exactly what it is. You set up a meeting by giving it a name, and putting in your name and email address. Then the meeting is given a URL with a random number in it that designates it as your meeting. You share the URL with the people you wish to attend the meeting and they mark what days work for them. Very slick.
March 5, 2005
FutureMail
FutureMail is a wonderful way to send yourself reminders or other email messages in the future. You can select the day and hour that you want the email delivered. Nicely, you can also subscribe to your own RSS feed of future emails.
March 4, 2005
Mysteries of the English Language
World Wide Words is a site that might take up a lot of your time today, if you like wordplay and interesting usages. Michael Quinon writes about English from a British point of view, leading to a lot of laughable misunderstandings. The site has indexes of pages and can be searched. They also offer an email newsletter and an RSS feed.
March 3, 2005
Yahoo Anniversary
Yahoo! Netrospective celebrates the tenth anniversary of Yahoo online. Look through a series of 100 images with captions to remember some of the top online moments in the last decade.
March 2, 2005
Kayak
Kayak is a website that offers a quick portal to a variety of travel websites. Do a single search and access all of the top travel sites and compare flight, hotel and car prices side by side.
March 1, 2005
Zniff
Zniff.com, now in beta, is a search engine that uses the database that users have created in Spurl. This means that the tags that users have entered are now searchable on a mass scale! The subtitle for the site is "the human search engine" with the line that it is "by humans, for humans."
I ran a couple of searches and found great results. Now all it needs is an RSS feed for changing results of searches. That would be ultimately sweet!