If you’ve ever read up on the Library of Congress, then you know the history that the historical archive holds. Some of the pieces of literature, and recordings that have made our country what it is today is housed inside its hallowed walls. Matt Raymond, of the Library of Congress reports on his blog that the LOC looks to be tearing those walls down.

Meaning, that the LOC now has its own YouTube channel. At present, there are 70 videos up. The topics vary from the first known moving image, to boxing cats, and so on. In fact, both of those videos are below for your viewing pleasure. And below those is a link to the LOC’s YouTube Channel.

Library of Congress YouTube Channel

Tags: News, Websites by JohnnyV - 6 Comments »

“All work and no play makes Jack a dull boy.”

We can credit Jack Torrence, Jack Nicholson’s character in the 1980 film The Shining for popularizing this proverb that dates as far back as the mid-1600s.

Americans continue to work more hours than their counterparts in other countries and as we are in the midst of a (finally!) government-acknowledged recession, it does not appear that in the near future that employers will be encouraging more vacation time, personal days, or working in a little “downtime” into our daily work schedule.

No worries some of us say!  Our lives are replete with a variety of great technological tools, by way of the internet, that allow us to never leave our desk to be entertained or “play.”  Social websites such as Facebook or MySpace offer an almost endless selection of “applications” for distraction from our stressful workday.  Yahoo! Games continues to offer games-arcade games, card games, board games, puzzle games…the list goes on and on.   Video sharing sites such as YouTube continue to bring us many laughs at the office with their quirky or sometimes scandulous videos.

Where am I going with this?  What do you do when these entertainment or play options are no longer allowed in the workplace?  I don’t see Mark from accounting carrying a Yahtzee game to the lunchroom for a quick roll of the dice or Marie challenging you to a game of paper football at her desk.

• What to you do to “relieve stress” during your workday via the internet?
• Do you only access these sites at work or at home as well?
• What is your opinion as to how this effects your productivity?

Tags: Fun, Games, Google, News, Social Networking, Technology, Websites by JD - 4 Comments »

Online video is one of the most effective way to market yourself and your blog or business. With the rise of user generated videos from users around the world, this has added another dimension to the internet marketing. These videos created by users like you and me are then embedded into blogs or websites and shared with friends and families via email. If the video is liked by many, it will also be shared by many, giving you rapid exposure. Ofcourse, to be able to do that we need service from sites like You Tube which allows us to share videos. Although, You Tube is the ” Big Dog ” when it comes to sharing videos, others sites and services shouldn’t be ignored. The more the better, it allows you to expose your business or blog to more people from around the world.

I usually try to list sites that offer service that might be useful for you, the readers. This post lists 48 video sharing sites that might be of interest to you. Not that you need to try all of them but more than one is certainly better. I hope the list will introduce you to some new sites, enjoy! [Read more →]

Tags: Videos, Websites by Ritu - 10 Comments »

You can call this post a successor of a previous post where I had written about 10 interesting sites. I think all the sites listed here are worthy of a bookmark and have proved to be extremely useful in someway or the other. Some of these sites you might know already and some you might not. Hopefully this list will introduce you to a service that you didn’t know about.

20. Similicio.us
Similicio.us is a search engine that finds related articles based on tags or bookmarks on Del.icio.us. If you find an interesting article, and want to explore what other similar articles are there on del.icio.us then this site is a must use. If you like an article, simply paste the URL and hit search, you will get results with related articles based on tags or bookmarks on Del.icio.us

19.Oovoo
Multi–user video chat application which supports upto 6 people simultaneously.You can use this application to send video messages and file to other oovoo members and video messages to people who don’t have this application as well.

18. Builtwith
A web based website profiler that lets you quickly look up all the technologies implemented in creating a website , example google, msn, etc. This nifty website is capable of capturing and identifying widgets, analytic tools, hosting software, advertising networks and the list goes on and on.

17. Splitbrowser
This one is for the mac fans. This browser allows you to split your screen into four parts so you can view and work on four different websites simultaneously. [Read more →]

Tags: Websites by Ritu - 12 Comments »

If it doesn’t exist on the first page of google it’s not there, right? Wrong! There are plenty of websites that are fun and productive that most of us don’t know about. In this post I have tried to collect some of them that might prove to be useful or plain fun for you to explore.

10. Uncyclopedia
This is the contender of Encyclopedia but the only thing that is different is the content itself. All the content and information you will find here are nonsense that are put forward with a straight face. If you are looking for facts and figures this certainly isn’t an option but if you are in need of hours of fun go ahead and check it out.

9. EXPN
No, it’s not ESPN. The ‘S’ is replaced by ‘X’ as it stands for Extreme. This site covers the dangerous aspects of sports, such as skating, surfing, motorcross and X Games. You can also find photos and videos of death defying stunts along with the sports column.

8. Bargainist
Who doesn’t love a good bargain? This site is updated several times daily which searches the web for daily deals, coupons and bargains to get you those goodies for cheap. Also you can find links to over 50 retailers and online stores where you can get a bargain.
[Read more →]

Tags: Productivity, Reviews, Websites by Ritu - 9 Comments »

You may have noticed most all media, technology, even household tasks are represented in “lists”. Top ten, bottom 10, best 50 or “to do”…lists.

ListBums is a community driven online multimedia platform where people can share information that combines text, photos and videos in an easy to read list format. Taking YouTube to the next level, ListBum users mix information on topics of interest, current events or breaking news stories and illustrate their points with embedded videos and pictures from all over the web. The user experience is both engaging and entertaining as lists are posted, shared, rated, added to and commented on by other ListBummers.

ListBum multimedia lists can be embedded onto your blog, website or favorite social networking site. Without redirecting viewers to listbums.com, readers can view content, add list items and rate lists directly from third party websites. [Read more →]

Tags: Services, Social Networking, Websites by Ritu - 10 Comments »