(August 20, 2005) — The ECHO project (at George Mason University) includes
a catalogue of 5,000 websites relating to the history of science, technology and industry, plus information and tools for those who want to create their own online science history site. ECHO's Dan Cohen says they aim to provide "a centralized resource for studying the history of science and technology online."
(August 13, 2005) — Critical thinking is a key element in computer security, and that's the approach of these lessons, which are aimed at teenagers and can be studied online or taught in a classroom. "Mostly the focus is on how to identify threats ... for example, spam," says Managing Director Pete Herzog. The program is available in several languages, and is used by schools, individuals, and home-schooling families.
(August 6, 2005) — The widely-respected medical reference for doctors, along with a Home Edition for lay people, is one of the most valuable online sources of health information. And authoritative, too: "We have over 300 authors, who are world experts in their field," says Associate Editor Rob Porter.
History Wired (July 30, 2005) — The Smithsonian Institution presents an innovative, multi-layered way of discovering objects in the collection of the Museum of American History. "It packs a lot of functionality and a lot of information into a relatively small space," says museum official Matt MacArthur.
(July 23, 2005) — Read news stories about the United States as viewed by the international press. Sometimes the stories are highly critical, but "we also want to show fairly the spectrum of opinion that's out there in the world," says publisher Robin Koerner. Stories in other languages are translated into English, with links back to the original version.
(July 16. 2005) — Watch the latest surgical procedures in live webcasts direct from state-of-the-art operating rooms. You can even e-mail questions direct to the OR. "The ability to access the world's leading surgeons ... really gives everybody access that they might otherwise not have," says company official Peter Gailey. In addition to the live operations, some 200 webcasts are archived for on-demand viewing.
(July 9, 2005) — New York's famed American Museum of Natural History showcases the latest in dinosaur scholarship. The museum has long been known for its dinosaur exhibits, but online visitors will have some advantages over museum-goers. "In some cases they'll even be able to get some better looks at things, up closer than they'll be able to see in the exhibit itself," says curator Mark Norell."
(July 2, 2005) — An exciting new way to look at news. Instead of headlines, a grid of 100 photos guides the viewer to the top stories of the hour. "You get this visual barometer of importance — sort of like you do with a traditional newspaper when you look at the size of a headline," says the site's creator, New York-based artist Jonathan Harris.
(June 25, 2005) — Live webcams take you into the aquarium "so that anyone in the world can enjoy the beauty of the ocean habitat without being near the ocean or having the opportunity to come to the aquarium," says web manager Jane Cross. The site also include information for students and teachers, conservation guidance for seafood consumers, and behind-the-scenes videos.
Volcano World (June 18, 2005) — "Our primary purpose is to make sure that current activity is catalogued," says website team member Prof. Shan De Silva, but there's also historic background on active and dormant volcanoes around the world ... and elsewhere, too. Volcanologists describe their work in one section; in another, teachers can find lesson plans and directions on how to build a classroom volcano model.
Interactive Atlas of the World's Languages in Danger of Disappearing (June 11, 2005) — The UN's cultural unit goes online with its definitive guide to threatened languages. Languages are an embodiment of the culture of a people, and "if a language dies out, then this body of knowledge, this culture also dies out," says UNESCO's Sabine Kuba. This new site went live only last month, and starts with endangered languages in Africa, with other regions to follow.
— If you can't come to Washington to enjoy the spectacular Asian art treasures in America's national museum, you can enjoy a virtual visit (without the crowds). "We feel that we should reach out to a much broader audience, especially the audience in Asia," says chief curator Massumeh Farhad. The website also features objects that are not currently on display in the galleries.
— Explore "deep time" by region or era on this easy-to-navigate website. This high-quality site is sponsored in part by the Univ. of California Museum of Paleontology, where David Lindberg explains that visitors "can explore different groups [of prehistoric animal species], and then again you can go laterally into a time period to find out what the plants" were like during that period.
Historical Anatomies on the Web (May 21, 2005) — High-quality scanned images from beautiful and scientifically significant books picturing the human body and its internal structures. The earliest volume online was published in 1543 by Andreas Vesalius, and it was a "revolution in the study of medicine and anatomy," says the curator of the online exhibit, Michael North. "And from then on, the anatomies basically just started getting better and better."
— Top researchers speak in hour-long audio interviews "designed to give you a bit of the taste of what they do and also a bit about their careers and how they got to where they are," says Academy spokesman Bill Skane. You'll learn about the routine of a working scientist, and they talk about what got them interested in a science career.
— Research and information about the science of olfaction. The right aroma "definitely can elevate your mood; it can help definitely increase your performance" on the job, says executive director Terry Molnar. Nose around this site (sorry!) for the latest fragrance research or the basics in an online course called Smell 101.
— Nutrition guidance from the US Dept. of Agriculture's National Agricultural Library. This website "offers a very broad depth of information on a variety of food and nutrition topics," says registered dietician Cathy Alessi, one of the nutritional professionals who keeps the site up-to-date.
— The Earth Day Network aims to take environmental activism to the other 364 days each year by stressing personal and community involvement. "We have something like 12,000 organizations globally, who in some way participate in our network," says the group's vice president, Mary Minette.
— This site is half-magazine, half-database, with raw numbers and analysis of migration issues, both from countries that receive migrants and the nations they come from. "We've created, I think, some really good interactive tools that people can use to get a better sense of this," says managing editor Kim Hamilton.
— From the respected publisher of "Science News" magazine comes this website with information aimed at children ages about 9–15. With weekly articles on current developments, "kids are actually learning what scientists are reporting as it's happening," says online editor Ivars Peterson.
— Information about the latest seismic events is posted online as soon as minutes after the event. Maps help you focus on major earthquake zones worldwide. And there's plenty of background information for students, teachers and anyone who's curious. "If you want to learn about earthquakes, you can go here first," says webmaster and geophysicist Lisa Wald.
— The online digital collection of the Library of Congress includes 10 million items, including handwritten presidential documents, early motion pictures, maps, and photographs. Audio resources include rare folk music and "oral histories of former slaves as to what their experiences were during the time of slavery," says the library's Guy Lamolinara.
— The numbers tell the story: disease, life expectancy, health insurance coverage, hospital admissions, and more. Much of the information is "actually available even before the printed copy" is published, says spokesperson Sharon Ramirez.
— The Hall of Fame honors more than 207 American women who have had "enduring, broad and significant impact across the country and/or across the world," says executive director Billie Luisi-Potts. Our choice of this website is in observance of Women's History Month.
— Demographic information is available on the government's own website, but for ease of use and maps and graphs that help non-specialists navigate through the date, you might try CensusScope, which also provides comparisons between the 2000 census and the previous one. "On our site you can get them both at the same time and then see a graph on top of it to see how they compare," says CensusScope director Bill Frey.
— For almost a decade, the Why Files, a project of the University of Wisconsin, has been providing in-depth articles on science topics in the news. "We try to dig behind the headlines to find our stories," says editor Terry Devitt.
— From the New York Public Library, a different way of looking at African American history during Black History Month. The online exhibit includes "25,000 pages of material ... to tell this really remarkable story in a very in-depth way," says Howard Dodson, who heads the library's Schomburg Center for Research in Black Culture.
— Some 30 physicists from 10 countries keep visitors up-to-date about their science and their lives. "They talk about their research in physics," says managing editor Chelsea Wald. "And they also write about stuff that's personal to them, their families [and] friends." It's a fascinating look "behind the curtain" at how science is practiced before those breakthroughts are announced.
— Images of some 48,000 flags are included in this comprehensive site (which has its own flag!). Contemporary national flags are just the beginning. The site also includes flags of "military [and] naval agencies, ... states and provinces, flags of municipalities, cities and towns, even some of individuals, like the royal family," says FOTW director Rob Raeside, geology professor and amateur vexillologist.
— For the latest in news from the frontiers of human spaceflight, robot probes, even the search for extra-terrestrial intelligence (SETI), check out this site, where science isn't stuffy. "We think that space should be cool," says managing editor Anthony Duignan-Cabrera. "The strength of Space.com is that it fires the imagination by presenting space and related subjects in an imaginative way."
— Read and hear the words of the slain civil rights leader from the Stanford University enterprise that is publishing the definitive 14-volume series of Dr. King's writings. Thanks to the Internet, "hundreds and even thousands of documents are available on our website, and people throughout the world can get access to information that just 20 years ago was only available to a handful of researchers," says King Papers editor Clayborne Carson.
— The online version of popular US cable television service The Weather Channel, this site provides current conditions and forecasts for nearly 100,000 locations worldwide. Forecasts begin with sophisticated computer models, says Weather.com's Tom Flournoy, "and then we have humans, 24-hours a day, meteorologists who look at the forecasts and if they see an anomaly ... they will correct the forecast."
[ Website of the Week took a Winter vacation December 25 – January 1. ]
— MathForum is "an online educational community that supports learning of mathematics and teaching of mathematics, pretty much arithmetic through calculus," says director Steve Weimar. Features include "Teacher2Teacher," where math instructors can exchange tips, and "Ask Dr. Math," for students needing help in geometry, algebra, and so on. The site has been online since 1992, so there's a huge archive of math-related information available here.
— OneLook is a specialized search engine that allows you to simultaneously look for a term in about 1,000 online dictionaries. Some are general purpose English dictionaries. Others, says founder Bob Ware, are quite specialized, reflecting the breadth of the Internet: "There's technical dictionaries out there; there's dictionaries of terms used in home construction, ... medical fields and the legal fields." You can also search language dictionaries.
— Craig Newmark started craigslist in San Francisco in 1995 as a kind of online bulletin board. There are now local versions in some 70 cities, with new ones being added all the time. CEO Jim Buckmaster says the most popular category is "jobs, followed by housing, followed by for-sale, and then by personals. ... And I should say it varies quite a bit from the city." Craigslist charges for employment ads in three U.S. cities, but everything else is free.
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