Useful WebApps For A Photo Pack Rat
Ask my wife and she will tell you, without hesitation, what a pack rat I am. I want my environment to look like a photo from Dwell magazine but it often looks like a tenured, mad-professor's office. I'd love to be more organized, especially in my collection of photography books and cameras. I've bought the same book more than once because I had forgotten I already owned it (expensive duplication) and I have lost cameras for years because I couldn't remember who I'd loaned them to.
This week I stumbled across two amazing web apps that just might help me in my struggle to be free of virtual clutter and organizing some of my real-life treasures. The first is Library Thing. I'm probably the last person who collects books to have come across Library Thing. I used to carry my list of photo books around with me in a spreadsheet on my pda but I wasn't very good at keeping it up to date mainly because the resulting list was not very attractive or dynamic. Then I used a propriety piece of software but it was installed on one of my laptops and, of course, that machine was never the one I was using when I wanted to enter new books.
Library Thing allows me to reference and maintain my photo book collection data anywhere I have access to the net. Currently, I only entered about 50 of my books that I could remember off the top of my head but data entry could not have been easier; it connects to Amazon or the Library of Congress so searching to find your books is super easy. You can tag your books like Flickr objects and add your own data and reviews as well as reference material available on the web. A collection of under 200 books is free. Larger collections cost $10 a year or $25 for lifetime access. I'm going to try to find time to list more of my photo books this weekend. If it lives up to the promise and buzz it has, Library Thing will be well worth the $25.
Squirl is a similar kind of application to Library Thing except that it is for cataloging collections. Creating an account and a collection for my cameras was, again, super easy. I uploaded pictures of cameras directly from my flickr account and post details about a small part of my accidental camera collection. Again, collections under 200 items are free; more than that and you have to pay. As I don't own more than 200 cameras (yet) this restriction shouldn't be a problem. Squirl, like Library Thing, is in beta but it doesn't seem quite as robust as Library Thing yet (try searching in groups or deleting items in your catalog but not in a collection to see what I mean) but it does seem robust enough. There are also export tools for both applications if you're worried about backing up your hard-entered data or for moving it elsewhere in the future. Also, there is a social aspect to both applications although I'm not sure that is too appealing to me.
Time will tell if these applications remain useful to me after the novelty factor has worn off but so far, the indications are that these applications will be useful. Perhaps they might be useful for you too.
This week I stumbled across two amazing web apps that just might help me in my struggle to be free of virtual clutter and organizing some of my real-life treasures. The first is Library Thing. I'm probably the last person who collects books to have come across Library Thing. I used to carry my list of photo books around with me in a spreadsheet on my pda but I wasn't very good at keeping it up to date mainly because the resulting list was not very attractive or dynamic. Then I used a propriety piece of software but it was installed on one of my laptops and, of course, that machine was never the one I was using when I wanted to enter new books.
Library Thing allows me to reference and maintain my photo book collection data anywhere I have access to the net. Currently, I only entered about 50 of my books that I could remember off the top of my head but data entry could not have been easier; it connects to Amazon or the Library of Congress so searching to find your books is super easy. You can tag your books like Flickr objects and add your own data and reviews as well as reference material available on the web. A collection of under 200 books is free. Larger collections cost $10 a year or $25 for lifetime access. I'm going to try to find time to list more of my photo books this weekend. If it lives up to the promise and buzz it has, Library Thing will be well worth the $25.
Squirl is a similar kind of application to Library Thing except that it is for cataloging collections. Creating an account and a collection for my cameras was, again, super easy. I uploaded pictures of cameras directly from my flickr account and post details about a small part of my accidental camera collection. Again, collections under 200 items are free; more than that and you have to pay. As I don't own more than 200 cameras (yet) this restriction shouldn't be a problem. Squirl, like Library Thing, is in beta but it doesn't seem quite as robust as Library Thing yet (try searching in groups or deleting items in your catalog but not in a collection to see what I mean) but it does seem robust enough. There are also export tools for both applications if you're worried about backing up your hard-entered data or for moving it elsewhere in the future. Also, there is a social aspect to both applications although I'm not sure that is too appealing to me.
Time will tell if these applications remain useful to me after the novelty factor has worn off but so far, the indications are that these applications will be useful. Perhaps they might be useful for you too.
Comments
i'll have to consider squirl for everything else i collect.