There is a long standing custom in the blogosphere of writing about fun or entertaining topics on Fridays. A number of academic blogs I used to read had Friday blog posts showing photos of cats, for example. I like cats too, but that is not what I’m going to write about today. Instead, I am going to review five free Web tools.
1. Pew Internet & American Life Project
This is probably one of the world’s most quoted sources of data on Internet usage and its effects on society. Alas, the organization is exclusively concerned with Americans (I have long wanted to see a Canadian version of it, perhaps also an EU or British version too), but the trends and data are still very much worth a look. Where else can you find information on generational differences in Internet use (here is the Pew chart on generational differences). The differences are important for information professionals to know. For example, Pew found that 82% of those in the Gen X and older (i.e. age 33 and older) use to the Internet to find health information. In contrast, the most popular (72%) activity for Gen Y (aged 18-33) is watching online videos – that leads directly into my second item.
I recently discovered Academic Earth when somebody else referred me to it. The website’s mission can be summarized by its tagline: “Thousands of video lectures from the world’s top scholars.” Disciplines covered by this website include political science, economics, computer science, English, philosophy, medicine and astronomy. This is not a replacement for being a student in university, but it does offer another way to begin learning about new topics or to refresh your knowledge. It strikes me as a much expanded, deeper version of the videos put together at TED (it is an annual conference in California describing itself as “Inspired talks by the world’s leading thinkers and doers.”). TED is also worth a look for its inspired organization of content – it is both easy to navigate and a pleasure to use.
3. Evernote
Evernote is a company that has a simple tagline: “Remember everything.” The reason Evernote is useful is that you can upload notes (either text you type in, handwritten text, photos etc) and search all of it, tag material and so on. Further, it is all private to the user. This type of approach may not be appropriate for some organizations such as government, but the general premise of the idea should be considered the next time your organization’s intranet gets refreshed. The company offers two types of accounts: free and premium. The service can be accessed through the website and by mobile devices such as the iPhone. Alas, there is no application providing easy access for the BlackBerry which limits the utility of this for many business users.
4. Flickr
With more than one billion images available, flickr is one of the Web’s best sources of photos. Of course, it is not a replacement to professional sources of images such as Getty Images which is the place to go if you are looking for photos of breaking news events. Beyond the fun of browsing around, this source of images can be used to illustrate presentations, blog posts or other pieces of writings. If you are working on such a project and you have a limited budget, I would suggest you limit your search to Creative Commons material only (you can find that option under Flickr’s Advanced Search). If you use Creative Commons material, one should offer a link back to the original source or provide credit in some other way.
5. Mashable
Describing itself as “the Social Media Guide,” this website is one of the best places on the Internet to stay informed about new developments in social media. There is coverage on Wordpress (which powers this blog), YouTube, Twitter and many other mainstays of the social media world. With more than 200,000 people subscribing to their RSS feed, it is also quite a popular resource. I am only an occasional reader of the website, but I have the impression that is heavily populated by developers and those who use social media as part of their work. This focus is valuable since it provides an advance look on new developments and it shows how social media is being applied.
Related posts: