Lesson #21

I wanted to make a simple mashup using Google Maps, but I could not figure out how to get started with any of the mashup editors. The directions at Yahoo! Pipes and QEDWiki were simply too oblique to follow.
Addenda: Today (12/7), my colleague, NZ, got me started with Yahoo! Pipes.
After several fits and starts my mashup now works.
http://pipes.yahoo.com/pipes/pipe.info?_id=ZABRb_Ok3BGB7rsezKky6g

But yesterday (12/6), I chose Option Two.
At the Mashup Awards site, I looked at two global, real-time mapping sites. Filtering by category, I found "polling" with Ask500People ("Do you like your job?") and "wikipedia" with Wikipedia as it was being edited and where.
Fascinating.
On a more fun note, a very simple and award-winning mashup was Preetings. You can type a word or phrase, choose a photo, and then make a photo greeting card as in:
http://phreetings.com/trhmrr53
You can also make a photo mosiac of your Flickr photos using Mosaickr. Here is a low-resolution example:
http://mosaickr.com/free/e3926657b7e4b421ce4ba07fd23e63b665ec56d72816d7e929d2ff9f756cb25ff.jpg
In addition to these fun sites, a very complex mapping of your own musical preferences can be created at: http://musicovery.com/
You can then click to purchase your favorites songs from iTunes, ebay, or Amazon.com.
And finally, there is http://lazylibrary.com/ for folks too lazy to read a book longer than 200 pages!

Lesson #20

Using the Mashup Directory, I used the search box and found a Google Map of yard sales in Bowling Green, KY from the Bowling Green Daily News. From the Directory (proper), I looked at a Google Map of the 25 most dangerous cities in America. Each city had a more datailed cliackable map that listed police stations and after schools programs. The directory listed a total of 32 local and national crime-related mashups. I then looked at a Google Maps / Fortune mashup that listed the 25 best companies to work for in the United States.
For example, while the entire entry had much more detail, this was the headline for #19. Alston & Bird
What makes it so great?
At this 113-year-old Atlanta law firm, hourly employees get annual bonuses up to 9% of salary, an onsite center cares for 130 children, and a few years back the executive dining room was opened to the whole staff.
Headquarters: Atlanta
Top 3 (of 5) U.S. locations: Atlanta , Charlotte , New York 2005
revenue ($ millions): 395
Website: www.alston.com
It would seem that any business or service would benefit greatly from having a GoogleMaps mashup.

Lesson #19

I used the Yahoo! Podcasts directory to find the Slate Magazine Daily Podcast (at http://www.slate.com/podcast/). Given the paucity of political podcasts, especially interesting ones, I assume that podcasting will go video and explode, or continue to languish in obscurity when compared to its more popular Internet cousin: Blogs.