JayCut – With the ambitious goal of making videos like putty in the hands of users, JayCut offers free online video editing service that invites users to become fully engaged with videos rather than simply watching them.
Create and edit your very own video and edit it like a pro with JayCut’s easy and intuitive editor. This software is completely free, and it saves time so you can create your masterpiece in no time! To learn more about JauCut’s online editor, I recommend exploring the demo (click the image below).
Bloginity – One of the most prevalent website categories online today is that related to ‘entertainment’. There are hundreds if not thousands of gossip and celebrity sites and blogs, TV and film sources and many others under the entertainment umbrella. Standing out in this overcrowded arena is not only difficult, it’s almost impossible. But one particular site has managed to do just that with tons of style: Bloginity.
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EnergySavvy – What if there was an easy way for you to learn not only how to make your house more efficient in terms of energy and sustainability, but also how to save big bucks along the way? Now you can with EnergySavvy. This handsome website will guide you through the various aspects in your home that could be improved to save on energy and cash. No download is necessary. Simply insert your zip code and follow the questionnaire. Don’t worry. It’s not the boring questionnaire type you have in mind. This one’s colorful, interesting and over in a breeze.
Apart from making energy efficiency easier to homeowners, EnergySavvy exposes users to financial incentives that bring down energy use, provides additional tips, and offers listings of “the best energy efficiency contractors in the industry.” You can rely on EnergySavvy for speaking the truth; some of their partners include the US Department of Energy, the Energy Trust of Oregon, and other organizations.
Buzzillions – The next time you plan on making an online purchase, I assume you will first compare prices. Sites such as NexTag, Shopzilla and the like spring to mind, right? Well, there’s yet another price comparison and product review site you should add to your repertoire: Buzzillions. They claim to have over 13 million genuine product reviews submitted by actual online consumers (as opposed to paid reviews). Buzzillions is easy to use, nice to look at and it’s pretty straightforward.
See the screen shot below of the snowboard search I did on the site. I honestly couldn’t think of any downsides to Buzzillions, but whatever lowest price you find here for any given product search, I suggest comparing with Amazon. By the way, you should check out the Buzzilions mobile app -a particularly handy tool on the go.
Orangette – I just love it when a cooking blog is able to not only produce refreshing and inspiring recipes on a regular basis, but to keep doing it for years. The Web is full of cooking blogs, some of which are in my personal RSS list, but only a few are able to keep their top-notch content year in, year out. Ornagette is one of those selected few, and it scored lots of visits while it was featured as a Weekly Blog.
Written by the lovely Molly Wizenberg who has also published the fantastic book, A Homemade Life: Stories and Recipes from My Kitchen Table (Simon & Schuster, 2009, available at Amazon), Orangette’s first post was published back in 2004. The blog is packed with my favorite cooking blog must-have elements: beautifully written content, mouth-watering recipes, and stunning photos (taken by Molly herself!). See the pics below and click them to get to their respective posts: Whole Wheat Sablés with Cacao Nibs and Plum Crumble, respectively.
From Your Desks – Another Weekly Blog winner, From Your Desks is an inspiring website with a unique concept: “A working collaborative on the canvas of the desk. Both creative + everyday. Plus old work spaces, products and design ideas. Looking at the way we work.”
Every day a new post presents the desk/office environment of working professionals, some of whom you will know, others you will learn about for the first time. By examining the work space of each of these professionals, we get a glimpse of the intricate life of creative people; how they work, what inspires them, even what they enjoy the most in their desk’s surroundings.
Here are a couple of desk entries I found at From Your Desks. Click them to read the full post.
Knock Knock – Stationary is usually rather straightforward and expectable. But here we have Knock Knock, an online store offering super stylish and witty stationary items for the home and office. There are hundreds of cute and funny products on KnockKnock, all beautifully designed and with a humorous added value you won’t find at OfficeDepot.
I recommend starting out with browsing KnockKnock’s Top Selling Stuff. See some of these here below.
Brisbane Floods Before and After – The recent floods in Australia have hit the Brisbane area the hardest, leaving entire residential and commercial neighborhoods in a wet mess. See the before and after photos for yourself, courtesy of ABC News, Australia. Simply hover your mouse courser over each photo to see the difference. Any additional commentary would be superfluous. Here’s an example of before and after the flood at Rocklea, Brisbane.
Thrill of the Catch – This amazing game by Discovery Education and TakeMeFishing.Org lets you play on both sides of the fishing game; you can feed your fish of choice, choose its colurs, pick out a name for it, and feed it with its favorite food. Or, you could practice your fishing skills by trying to catch as many fish as possible. This is a lot of fun, and I’ve included two pics to lure you to sea. Don’t forget though: once you catch a fish, pat yourself on the back and throw it back to the water.
Corporation Inc. – In this cool game by Armor Games your goal is to “create the greatest, most profitable push-button company in the world.” To achieve the Inc status you must build offices and elevators, hire employees, make profit and even do some research to stay on top. This isn’t as easy as it seems, especially when you need to take care of employees’ needs at the expense of the company’s profits (a bit of sarcasm goes a long way).
For more cool games and all the best and newest updates on online games, be sure to visit our I Luv GAMES page!
The digital age has brought us numerous life-enhancing benefits. Some of the most obvious include super fast communication regardless of geographic location, social networks and virtual communities, and online shopping, just to name a few. But in terms of information consumption, there’s an interesting shift worth noting. I am referring to the infographic, the visually pleasing crossbreed between information and graphics that makes complex concepts, statistics and processes much easier to digest when compared to plain text-and-number info. Here at All My Faves we’ve already featured a few infographic sources, and we also have a special Infographics Mini Faves page for it.
So what makes infographics so different from charts and graphs, you might ask. These, too, serve as visual aids that facilitate data analysis and comprehension, right? Well, as Cool Infographics creator and Inforgraphic Designer Randy Krum explains, “Charts and graphs can communicate data; infographics turn data into information.” The bottom line characteristic of infographics distinguishing it from conventional data information is this: readers of infographics not merely acknowledge changes of statistics and data; they get the bigger picture fast and understand why these changes occurred in the first place.
Let’s dive right into the visuals and you will see why inforgraphics are making a steadfast appearance all over the Web (not to mention in major news websites and newspapers’ printed editions such as the NY Times). The first example is “The 10 Most Expensive Cities to Live In 2010” infographic by the Australian brokerage company, HomeLoanFinder.
Another great infographic example is this one below, showing the Rise of Walking and Biking, from 1990 to 2009 (source: Department of Transportation, appeared in GOOD Magazine, Jun 24, 2010). Click the image to launch the interactive infographic.
This third one is a knock-out, both in terms of aesthetics and functionality. Created by the talented team over at Information is Beautiful, Visualizing Bloodtests is the ultimate data-into-info example, and there’s no wonder why this visualization scored the 1st place in Wired Mag’s re-envisioning medical data design competition.
A standard bloodtest data document. Almost impossible to fully comprehend what’s going on there. and this is crucial to someones’ life!
Now see the magic of infographics (thanks to Information is Beautiful), turning the uncomprehensible document from above to an easy to digest content:
To wrap things up, see this interesting video talking about the use of infographics in the New York Times (via GestaltenTV).
TuneCrank – Do you have a band and think it’s time to stop rehearsing in your parents’ garage and expose your music to the world? Check out TuneCrack, a free service that helps independent musicians and artists to reach audiences online.
TuneCrank “finds, ranks and streams the best independent music out there for the whole world to hear.” Visitors can listen to each uploaded track and rank it (you can choose between ‘awesome’ – the hand gesture for rock, thumbs up or thumbs down). In addition, you can see each track’s play count, and if you click the plus sign to the right of each track box, you will see how users have ranked this song thus far. I played some tunes here on TuneCrank and I loved it. See the site’s current #1 song, Sweet On You by Johnny’s Body.
