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Thing 40 Mashup the Web

Page history last edited by Ann WS 15 years ago

Thing 40. Mashup the Web

Mashups are combinations of data from different Web sources that result in a new service or tool. Explore some interesting mashups--and maybe make one of your own.

 

Learn

 

There are thousands of mashups out there. Popular services like Twitter, Flickr, YouTube, and GoogleMaps have thousands of mashups. In Thing 32 we looked at GoogleMap mashups. Thing 27 Twitter also has a lot of mashups. Try a search on the name of one those services (or any other service you like and use) and mashup and you will have an avalanche of results. Many Web 2.0 sites like those mentioned above encourage people to develop mashups. They make their Web development tools or APIs (Application Programming Interface) available to outside developers. Here are Flickr's and Twitter's.


Remember this? These different images of letters combined to spell your word is a Flickr mashup.

 

t h-025 I N G Wood Type S

 

Here are some other interesting mashups for you to explore:


Music

Music is hotbed of mashups, whether for individual songs or creating new services. Try these:

Pandora.FM- Mashup last.fm & Pandora

Splice-Make a music mashup

 

Books

bkkeepr-A Twitter mashup that lets you track your reading and bookmark on the go, via the web and SMS

Lazy Library-"read less. get more." Pulls book data from Amazon and filters out anything with more than 200 pages.

BookTour-BookTour makes finding when a favorite author is coming to your town as easy as checking the weather. Has features for authors, too.
 LibWorm-Mashes up updates from 1400 RSS feeds+ from library sites. The contents of these feeds are then available for searching & search results can be output as an RSS feed that the user can subscribe to in his/her aggregator. LibWorm is intended to be a search engine, a professional development tool, and a current awareness tool for people who work in libraries or care about libraries.

  

Social

Ping.fm-A simple service that lets you update your status on a multitude of social networks at once.

Lunchbox-a mashup of Google Maps and Yelp. Lunchbox makes finding a place to eat as simple as searching by zip code. 

Wheel of Food--Enter zip code and let the wheel spin!

 

Photos/Flickr

Visual Headlines-A Flickr mashup that pull in images that relate directly to current headlines from CNN. This unique approach to gathering interesting visual data is complimented by an elegant interface.

Interestingness-A daily dose of interesting photographic inspiration from Flickr.

Flickr Memari-Create, customize, and send a memory matching game from your Flickr images.

Mashface-Mashup photos and video.

  

Video

TimeTube-Build a timeline of videos based on your keyword.

Last.fm+Youtube-A mashup of  Last.fm and YouTube. "It’s best described as an online music television based on your taste."

 

Google

Let Me Google That for You-"For all those people that find it more convenient to bother you with their question rather than google it for themselves."

CrimeReports-A Google Maps mashup that lets you search crime reports by location in near real-time.

Walkable-Find the "walkability" score of over 2500 neighborhoods.

 

Do

 

Watch this 5 minute video:

 

YouTube plugin error

 

2. Explore some of the mashups above and add one or more to your blog--or blog about it.

3. Search the Web and find a few more mashups that look useful.

4. Share what you've found.

5. Make a Mashup-These sites let you find and combine info to make a "custom" mashup. Embed it in your blog.

  • Dapper-Extract and use information from any site on the Web and create a new "dapp" or application.
  • Polyvore-Mix and match images from anywhere on the web, to create outfits, interior designs, or any kind of collage. The examples are all fashion, but you can use images from anywhere on the Web.  or site.
  • Travelr-Show your Flickr photos on a map.
  • Bubblr-Fun flickr mashup that lets you add cartoon bubbles to photos.
  • Phreetings-Create photo greeting cards using a drag-and-drop technique with Flickr images.
  • BigHugelabs-An old favorite from the original 23 Things On a Stick. Mash your photos in many ways.
 
 
 

Blog Prompts

 

  1. Which mashups did you explore? Were they useful?
  2. Can you think of any uses for mashups at the library or at home?
  3. Which of the make a mashup tools did you use? How were they to use?
  4. Did you find other mashups we should know about?

 

 
For the Curious  (optional)

 
Yahoo!Pipes is a way to build your own mashup. It is relatively easy (!) and there are helpful screencasts. Here is one on Building Your First Pipe. Try building a mashup using Yahoo!Pipes and share it on your blog.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Comments (3)

LeAnn Suchy said

at 10:11 am on Jun 26, 2009

Man, I'm bummed, LazyLibrary is no more! GoDaddy says you can buy the domain. That's too bad, because I liked it. Well, not for me, but my sister is a "lazy reader" and I was going to show it to her this weekend.

Ann WS said

at 9:11 am on Apr 17, 2009

Thanks, Laura--the links should work now.

Laura Miller said

at 12:07 am on Apr 17, 2009

The links for Interestingness and TimeTube don't work. The correct URLs are: http://interes.tingness.com for Interestingness and http://dipity.com/mashups/timetube for TimeTube

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