INFOMINE: Scholarly Internet Resource Collections
http://infomine.ucr.edu/
A multi-disciplined, annotated directory of tens of
thousands of links to "university level research and educational tools on
the Internet." Includes "databases, electronic journals, electronic
books, bulletin boards, mailing lists, online library card catalogs, articles
... [and] other types of information." Tens of thousands of records, some created
by librarians, others generated by robot-crawlers. Searchable and browsable.
From the University of California, Riverside. LII
http://lii.org/
Recently re-designed and revised. Searchable, browseable Web site of Internet
resources selected and evaluated by librarians for their usefulness to public
librarians and the general public. All entries are carefully reviewed and
evaluated before entry into the lii.org database and then maintained throughout
their life cycle. The motto of lii.org: "Websites You Can Trust." LII
http://www.answers.com/
Answers.com displays quick answers for factual queries. With one search, Answers.com will search content from over 100 encyclopedias, dictionaries, glossaries, and atlases and display results from matching entries.
http://www2.hawaii.edu/~jacso/extra/egyeb/poly-bio.htm
"Access biographical information, sketches, and full biographies of famous
and infamous historical figures, politicians, scientists, authors, artists
& athletes." Designed by library school professor and reference
reviewer Peter Jacso.
http://www.brbpub.com/pubrecsites.asp
Links to national, state, county, and city public record sites as well as
Canadian and U.S. territories. LII
OneLook Dictionaries, The Faster Finder
http://www.onelook.com/
Search hundreds of general and specialized English dictionaries simultaneously,
or select the ones you want to search. Millions of words indexed. LII
Online Searchable Death Indexes & Records: A Genealogy Guide
http://www.deathindexes.com/
This site "gathers together links to online death indexes by state and
county. Included are death indexes, obituaries, probate indexes and cemetery
and burial indexes." Browsable by state. LII
http://www.bartleby.com/reference/
This site has a combined database of more than twenty respected reference works
and several anthologies and individual works of poetry, fiction, and
non-fiction. In addition to out-of-copyright editions of classic works such as Bartlett's,
Bulfinch, and the Cambridge History of English and American
Literature the collection also includes recent editions of the Columbia
Encyclopedia, The World Factbook, Roget's II: the New Thesaurus,
the American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language, Gray’s
Anatomy, and much more. Fully searchable. LII
Wikipedia: The Free Encyclopedia
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Main_Page
"Wikipedia is a free content encyclopedia that is being written
collaboratively by contributors from all around the world. The site is a
WikiWiki, meaning that anyone ... can edit any article. ..." Without
editorial oversight, the quality of the content on this site varies, but it is
worth exploring. The English version has over 500,000 entries. Spanish, French,
and Esperanto are among the dozens of other languages offered. LII
http://healthfinder.gov
Federal website for consumers, developed by the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services and other agencies, with links to information and websites from over 1,500 health-related organizations. Advanced search allows you to limit by audience (teens, men, etc.). Also available in Spanish. LII
http://www.medlineplus.gov/
This directory site is designed to lead the user to
resources containing information that will help with researching their health
questions. It includes information from MEDLINE, links to self-help groups, the
United States Pharmacopeia (USP) drug database, medical dictionaries,
directories of doctors and hospitals, access to National Institute of Health
consumer-related organizations, clearinghouses, health-related organizations,
and a search databases section with dozens of databases on topics such as
clinical trials, nutrition, AIDS, cancer, etc. Also available in Spanish. LII
http://www.pubmedcentral.nih.gov/
Free full-text
articles from biomedical and life sciences journals. The database is managed by the National Center for Biotechnology
Information in the National Library of Medicine. LII
FindLaw: Internet Legal Resources
http://www.findlaw.com/
FindLaw is the best place to start consumer-level legal research. Run by a private company, the site provides intuitive and easy access points to relevant information for the public, students, legal professionals, business, corporate counsel, and legal news sources. The site also features a lawyer search, legal forms, organizations, and other valuable legal information. LII
http://fatty.law.cornell.edu/
The best single starting
point on the Web for doing research into all laws: case law, state and federal
code, Supreme Court decisions, etc. Full-text, searchable database of all law
reviews and journals on the Internet. Updated nightly. Another search
interface, LawCrawler, helps you focus your search on legal issues on the Web.
Also includes Legal News, legal forms, organizations, law firms and lawyers,
judicial opinions and case law, consultants, and more. LII
http://www.pantheon.org/
An encyclopedia of mythology, folklore, and religion, divided to six geographical regions: Africa, Americas, Asia, Europe, Middle East, and Oceania. Special interest areas (Arthurian legends, Greek heroic legends, bestiary, genealogical tables, etc.) will help your search. LII
http://www.sacred-texts.com/index.htm
This site consists of "significant primary texts relating to religion and
mythology." There are Ancient texts including neolithic, Australian,
Pacific, African, Ancient Near East, Greek and Roman, Northern European,
Egyptian, Native American, and Modern Pagan. Eastern contains Shinto, Hinduism,
I Ching, Taoism, Confucianism, Buddhism, Sikhism, and Jainism. Western has a
hypertext Bible and other Christian texts, Judaism, Mormonism, Bahai'i, Islam,
Zoroastrianism, esoteric, occult, and fringe religions. There are also writings
by freethinkers Charles Darwin, Thomas Paine, Mark Twain, Clarence Darrow, and
Albert Einstein. LII
http://www.bbc.co.uk/worldservice/people/features/world_religions/
Each of the six religions covered -- Islam, Hinduism, Christianity, Buddhism,
Judaism, and Sikhism -- includes the basic tenets of faith, history, and useful
links. Some also include contemporary
issues, glossaries, or biographies of major figures. LII
Business
http://bigcharts.marketwatch.com/historical/
BigCharts offers, among other things, historical stock prices dating from January 2, 1970 to present. LII
http://www.hoovers.com/
Hoover’s offers extensive
information about companies, industries, people, and products. It covers public and private companies, both
nationally and internationally. Many
libraries pay to upgrade so their patrons can access more in-depth information
on the site. LII
Small Business Network Resource Library
http://smallbiz.infopeople.org/
A research center for all things related to small
business. The most relevant part of the
site is the “Information Resources” section, offering recommended websites for
doing business with the government, demographics and market research, laws and
requirements, start-ups, and more. The
site also offers a Spanish version.
Directories
All Nations Expatriates & Travelers Telephone Search Engine
http://www.embassyworld.com/directories/global_telephone.html
"It gives you the calling code instructions from each of the world's
nations to any other nation. In addition this engine allows you to search every
online telephone directory in the world. (Over 700 directories) Plus it
gives you an instant link to all of the embassies of the nation you are
calling, the lowest international rates for your call, and a link to that
countries voltage for those who are planning on traveling or relocating to that
nation." They also provide a great compilation of maps of the world. LII
http://www.theultimates.com/
White Pages, Yellow Pages, as well as a trip planner and an e-mail directory. Search six separate directories from one page. Includes reverse look-ups and map look-ups. LII
http://www.cia.gov/cia/publications/factbook/
Country profiles, flags, and reference maps for the popular print version. LII
http://www.firstgov.gov/
FirstGov is the official U.S. gateway to all government information. It provides a search engine and topical links to millions of webpages from federal and state governments, the District of Columbia, and U.S. territories. FirstGov also provides a Spanish-language web portal. LII
HyperHistory Onlinehttp://www.hyperhistory.com/online_n2/History_n2/a.htmlShort biographical sketches of famous people in history (browseable by time period or alphabetical index), timelines for world civilizations (browseable by time period), key historical events by year, and a decent collection of historical world maps. A lot of things are cross hyperlinked, so you can get more information and move from one section of the site to another. LII
http://www.nationmaster.com/
A central source for graphically
comparing nations by data from the CIA World Factbook, United Nations,
World Health Organization, World Bank, World Resources Institute, UNESCO,
UNICEF, and OECD. Also includes data
for individual countries, including maps and flags. LII
http://www.bls.gov/
Easy entry into the full range of economic data and
analysis produced by BLS. Here is where you'll find the statistics and reports
on employment and unemployment, price (such as the Consumer Price Index), living conditions, compensation,
productivity, and more. LII
http://www.prb.org/
The Population Reference Bureau (PRB) website
provides a comprehensive virtual gateway to data and reports on population
trends. Most useful to first-time users is the access by topic, available from
the left sidebar menu, which includes 16 subjects ranging from education to gender
to income and race. Also found here are menu options for the six major regions
of the world, and links for quick access to PRB's main focus areas of health,
environment, and population trends. Other features of interest on this site are
the "DataFinder," which offers searching by 95 demographic variables
for 220 nations of the world, as well as for the United States and individual
states. Also useful is the extensive "Glossary of Population Terms,"
which includes dozens of definitions related to the study of demographics. LII
http://www.amstat.org/sections/sis/sports.html
How do TV commentators know that Barry Bonds'
batting performance in the first two weeks of May was the worst ever by a
player who had hit over .400 in April? The web offers an embarrassment of
riches in sports statistics, and the American Statistical Association, which
normally concerns itself with weightier matters, offers a portal with links to
a couple dozen statistical sites covering sports, major and minor.
http://www.census.gov/
Census 2000 statistics in the following categories: people, business, geography, newsroom, and special topics. The site includes complete access to the Statistical Abstract of the United States and quick access to information by location using the American FactFinder. LII
http://www.hometownnews.com/
Links to more than 2,600 daily and weekly U.S. newspapers. Many of these
newspapers don't have archives on the commercial databases but will have small
date range archives on their own website.
LII
http://wunderground.com/
Weather conditions and forecasts from around the globe, as well as hard to find
daily historic weather records from airport weather stations. Use FastForecast
to "enter a city, state, country, zip code, or station code for the
current National Weather Service forecast." Includes links to hundreds of
weather sites; weather cams with live pictures of current weather conditions in
hundreds of locations; tropical storm-related sites; ski reports; radar and
satellite imagery; and temperature, jet-stream, and upper-air maps. LII.
world-newspapers.com: World Newspapers, Magazines, and News Sites in English
http://www.world-newspapers.com/
A searchable directory of online world newspapers, magazines, and news sites in English, from the customary to the bizarre, including alternative online publications. In addition, the news is searchable by magazine, newspaper, news, and television photo galleries. LII
http://www.artcyclopedia.com/
Online index to exhibits searchable by artist, and browseable by movement, medium, subject, nationality of artist, or women artists. Painting and sculpture are most heavily represented, but other media are also included. LII
http://www.askart.com/AskART/index.aspx
The free content available on this site (which also contains for-pay content) includes directories of artists, dealers, auction houses, galleries, and museums in the U.S. Basic information about artists is also available: birth, death, museum holdings, etc. LII
http://www.allmusic.com/
From the publishers of the standard print reference by the same name, AllMusic.com provides ratings and reviews of over 700,000 albums. Searchable by artist, album, label, song, or style. There are music maps that track the evolution of music genres, articles, and an extensive glossary. Artist entries are exhaustive—complete discographies, history, influences, reviews, and more. LII
http://www.arkivmusic.com/
Detailed information on thousands of classical recordings, both in and out of
print, and opera DVDs. The site is
"browsing" only, unless you know the label catalog number. Can browse
by composers, conductors, performers, ensembles, operas, and record labels.
http://www.free-scores.com/index_uk.php3
A directory of links to sheet music for dozens of instruments—wind, string, keyboard, voice, and other. Currently boasts over 2,300 fully free pieces of sheet music. LII
http://www.fantasticfiction.co.uk/
Searchable by author or book title, this free site gives biographical, bibliographical, and award information for authors and excellent information about various print editions, as well as links to purchase the books from retailers or second-hand.
http://www.gnooks.com/
Gnooks is a reader’s community that helps you discover new writers you will like based on the books and authors you already like. Their ever-changing “Map of Literature” is the chief attraction—pointing you to new authors based on authors you already know and enjoy.
http://www.mcpl.lib.mo.us/readers/series/juv/
From the Mid-Continent Public Library in Missouri, the most comprehensive list of books in a series that I’ve found. Covers children’s and YA titles, and is arranged and accessible by series title, series subject, book title, and book author.
http://www.gutenberg.org/catalog/
Project Gutenberg is the longest existing producer of free eBooks. Their collection totals over 15,000 eBooks produced by volunteers. Most of the Project Gutenberg eBooks are works that are in the public domain, at least in the United States. All may be freely downloaded and read, and redistributed for non-commercial use. LII
http://us.imdb.com
The most complete collection of movie and film information you’re going to find—search for movie titles, characters, quotes, plots, people working together, and more. LII.
Library of Congress Prints and Photographs Reading Room
http://www.loc.gov/rr/print/catalog.html
Access to approximately 2/3 of the LOC’s prints and photographs, approximately one million digital images. The site warns fairly obviously that “not all images displayed in this catalog are in the public domain.” LII
http://www.npr.org/archives/
Search audio archives of NPR radio programs from 1996 to date. LII
http://www.picsearch.com/
“A search engine for pictures and images with a relevancy ranking they claimed is unrivalled among other web image search engines. Picsearch also claims to be 100% family friendly due to its filtering of “offensive material.”
http://www.singingfish.com/
"Singingfish offers the world’s largest index of streaming media, with
currently over 10 million streams, mp3s, and downloads, and 200,000 to 300,000
files added monthly." Streaming media is content delivered over a network
that can be played on a receiving computer prior to the delivery of the entire
file.
Consumer Resources
http://bbb.org/
The Better Business Bureau provides consumer and business tips, information on non-profits, e-commerce, and consumer ratings of various websites. LII
California Department of Consumer Affairs
http://www.dca.ca.gov/
Look up a company or individual in an occupation licensed by the CDCA (accountants, acupuncturists, architects, chiropractors, dentists, doctors, veterinarians, and much more). Also check out the Bureau of Automotive Repair, that registers and regulates over 30,000 California automotive repair facilities, and licenses smog check, lamp and brake inspection stations. LII
http://www.consumersearch.com/www/
Product reviews in over 800
categories, both browseable and searchable.
Their reviewers include "former writers for Consumer Reports,
PC Magazine, & The New York Times."LII
Additional Techniques and Tools
http://clusty.com/
A search engine offering clustered search results grouping similar items together.
Google Search Features and Shortcuts
http://www.google.com/help/features.html
Search shortcuts for books, a calculator, definitions, file types, products, movies, news headlines, phonebook entries, street maps, travel info, weather, & more. LII
http://www.librarianinblack.net
Sarah Houghton’s site about library tech, reference websites, & virtual reference.
http://www.noodletools.com/
Citation tools (MLA & APA), NoodleQuest (develop a search strategy based on your topic), and recommendations for search tools based on your needs. LII
http://www.researchbuzz.com/
Tara Calashain’s site about search engines, library technology, & more.
http://www.resourceshelf.com/
Gary Price’s site about search engines, government information, and libraries.
http://help.yahoo.com/help/us/ysearch/tips/tips-01.html
Search shortcuts for airport information, area codes, dictionary definitions,
exchange rates, stock quotes, traffic reports, current weather, &
more. LII