So Many Sites

In perusing the Web 2.0 Awards nominees (174 Web 2.0 sites in 41 categories), I felt almost overwhelmed and so I clicked on the short list. The short list was quite helpful in giving a quick over view of the top three sites in all the categories. It was noteworthy that in the category of "News and Blog Guides", Google Blog Search was #1, Bloglines #2, and Technorati #3. Del.icio.us was #1 in Bookmarking. The short list would be a useful guide to steer people in the right direction for general "what would I use for..." questions.

Since I hadn't eaten for awhile and we're going on a road trip soon, I selected the Food category. The #1 site for Food was "imcooked". However, that site is a web community for video recipe sharing, and I was looking for something that could be useful in travel. Most helpful was the Urbanspoon. It was quite useful, because it listed for each city, the restaurants by type (hungry for Indian?)and neighborhood. With a click, you can get a map; another click gives you cross streets, phone #, etc. At the page for a specific restaurant, you can get a menu. (I think if the restaurant doesn't present a menu, I wouldn't bother). There are also reviews of some, voting, and price range. Urbanspoon would be really helpful when you're traveling, especially if you have a mixed bag like our family where two out of five are vegetarians. I can see this web site being more useful at a Visitor's Bureau than a library, but we do get visitors at the library as well. Bon appetit!