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No blogging for a week? Well you know I was either on vacation or sick. And this time I was sick! Fever and flu. Ugh.
This coming week I am on spring break with my children, so don't expect regular posting.
I will return to full posting strength on Monday, April 9th.
See you then!
Starting the process for a new Long Range Plan at our library, I was thrilled to see that the Pew Hispanic Center has done a study of Latinos Online. The interesting part is the role that language dominance and background play in Latino use of the Internet.
This is interesting and important reading for those of us trying to serve Spanish-speaking community members. Definitely one on my bookmark list!
I am the type of person who loves to change the desktop wallpaper on a regular basis. I like to have seasonal choices, surprising ones, and nature themes. Desktopography is a fascinating site that is in its third set of releases. They focus on nature themes but with a modern twist. To add to the ambiance, their Flash site has background music. Enjoy!
AltWeeklies offers articles from over 100 alternative newspapers in one convenient place. You can view the latest top articles, see what the hot topics are, view movie, book and music pieces, or read opinion pieces from a wide variety of perspectives.
MozillaZine has a handy list of Problematic extensions for Firefox. These are the great little add-on programs that make Firefox so very versatile. But some of them cause issues.
Right now, I have a toolbar that won't save changes so my Del.icio.us buttons disappear every time I shut down Firefox. Drives me wild! I am hoping that by removing some of the add-ons I use least that I can get back the add-on I use most! Any thoughts or ideas on what might be causing this??
JungleCrazy offers the top deals from Amazon.com in one easy list. You can browse the most popular items immediately, do a product search, browse the tags, and find Amazon coupon codes. This is not a site to even take a look at if you are trying curb spending. Yes, there are lots of dollars to be saved, but even more to be spent!
The Cullom-Davis Library wiki has a handy listing of State Blue Books from across the country. The guide is clear about which blue books are only available in print. For those states, a link is provided to the official state site. Otherwise there is a link directly to the online version. Bookmark this one for your reference lists!
Good-Tutorials offers over 13,000 Photoshop tutorials. Everything from the basics to fancy effects are covered in easy-to-follow tutorials. Recommended to any library that uses Photoshop.
Pocket PC Thoughts is a website dedicated to hand-held PCs. You can find information on the top software, newly released hardware, recent articles, and active forums where you can join the conversation.
Libraries are using pocket pcs with their staff, especially in larger buildings to allow mobile access to the catalog and sometimes even checkout capability. This is certainly an area to be aware of.
Calorie Count is a site provided by About.com that offers access to calorie information on a wide variety of foods. It has general foods, and then also offers information on specific brands and restaurants which is really helpful. Activities are also given calorie burning information. Additionally, you can join the site and discuss health issues, tag websites, create a to-do list, and much more.
Trailfire offers a new way to categorize, recommend and share websites. You build a collection of themed sites to share with the community. In order to build a trail, you must register with the site, but you can view previously built trails without registering. The trails can easily be viewed by category, most recent additions, popular, and "hot".
This is an interesting way to share sites. It may be a new way to create online pathfinders for subjects. Additionally, we have been looking for a site kind of like del.icio.us to use for our children's links. Because this allows thumbnails of screenshots, making it more accessible and welcoming for kids, this may be a good solution. Definitely something I need to keep my eye on.
Reuters Africa offers African news. You can read by individual country, see the latest headlines as well as the top news stories. Additionally, there is investment information, RSS feeds, and interactive TV.
DealCatcher offers free coupons as well as links to great sales. You can browse by your favorite store, see the top online coupons, find the top deals of the day, and much more. The site also offers RSS feeds for newly announced deals.
MajorGeeks is a site that offers shareware and freeware utilities for download. Browse under the type of utility from anti-virus to back ups to drivers to firewalls. Enough to make any geek giddy.
I firmly believe that libraries need to start looking more at freeware and shareware, especially open source software. Libraries are all about an open flow of information and so is open source software. Seems like a match made in libraryland.
Personal Google Search Engine is pretty clever. You can retype over my Menasha Public Library title, and create your own. Once yours is typed, you get your own URL for that title. Nice and easy!
Thanks to I Want To for the link.
TechPresident is a site that tells you just how the candidates for President are using the Internet in their campaigns. They follow Flickr feeds, MySpace friends, Technorati and more. Additionally, you can subscribe to a news feed that keeps you abreast of new developments in campaigns. This is a very interesting time in national politics where websites, online video, and more are really coming into their own.
Fantastic Fiction is a British site covering science fiction, fantasy, horror, mysteries, thrillers, and much more. They offer lists of new releases, as well as links to bibliographies for over 10,000 authors and information on over 200,000 titles. This is a great one to have on your lists to recommend to sci fi and fantasy lovers. It is information for Britain, so publication dates may be different.
Gather is a site that offers a large number of ways to interact with one another as well as find information important to you. You can tag websites, share links to articles, share images, read "essential" articles on given subjects, and join groups that discuss specific topics. You can get a free membership in order to leave comments and start your own groups, but you can also subscribe to groups using RSS feeds which lets you read all of their shared articles. The site is nicely laid out and the breadth of choices before you is amazing. Definitely worth checking out.
The BBC has a great site about Climate Change. It offers information on the evidence of global warming, the impacts on our planet, adapting, policies, and links to related websites.
Podcast Bunker is a site that offers a collection of what they consider the best podcasts available. They have a great Top 20, as well as a nice collection by subject. Subjects include sports, news, and computers. The best part of the site is their large selection of buttons which offer you many choices about how you want to handle the podcast. You can subscribe to the RSS feed, listen to a 30 second preview, see how other listeners have rated it, or use your iTunes profile.
OpenCongress is a project of the Sunlight Foundation and PPF that recently launched. It offers access to bills, congress members, committees, industries, and issues. You can view blog entries or recent news as well. Additionally, you have easy access to the most viewed members of the Senate and House as well as the most-viewed bills. The slick, clean interface combined with a bevy of RSS feeds makes this the place to go for congressional information.
Braingle is a site filled with thousands of brain teasers, riddles, and trivia. They have a daily brain teaser that you can subscribe to via RSS or email. Everything is ranked by popularity as well as difficulty. You can also try some of their brain exercises or Mentalrobics to keep your mind limber.
ChooseandWatch allows you to watch over 250 TV channels online. They are broken into categories like news, business, music, movies, educational, entertainment, and sports. Under each category are channels you can watch right on this site or ones that will connect you to another site.
ThisNext is a site which mixes two popular things together into an addictive blend: shopping and social networking. Get recommendations on products, create a list of your own recommendations, make a wish list for your friends and family of things you would love as gifts, and much more. If you love to shop, this is the social site for you.