Lesson #7: Web 2.0 Continues

In the book category I liked Lulu because you can publish your own book. I also checked out VuFind because it uses open source software. I tried the demo of the site to look up pickling. With just a click I narrowed the search by genre (cookbooks) and topic (canning and preserving). The layout would take some time to get used to but I liked the ease of use. It's something different than the OPAC we are used to at OCLS. I think we could all get some ideas about different catalog search methods. Another good site, mango, is under the education category. Learning languages is very popular. When we had the Rosetta Stone as a free database, I always got comments about how patrons thought it was such a great tool. Since we no longer have Rosetta Stone, I guess mango is an alternative to that software. I like its total immersion learning approach. On a personal note, I love shopping so I naturally gravitated toward the retail category. There's a site called Etsy that sells really cool handmade items. They have a blog on the site with craft how-tos, videos, reviews, events, etc. There's also a section where you can request to have custom items made.
Just for fun: Want to bring out that inner artiste? I recently stumbled upon a really cool site where you can create your own Jackson Pollock painting using your keyboard. Check it out! jacksonpollock.org