If you are not using Mash-ups, you really are making your life online a lot less interesting than it ought to be
If you are not using Mash-ups, you really are making your life online a lot less interesting than it ought to be. For Luddites, these little goodies are applications that combine the functionality of two or more sources to create a whole new service. Weatherbonk (.com) is a great example. It combines the godsend also known as Google Maps (which comes with a searchable, 'pannable' interface) with reputed weather resources to create an online forecaster way more reliable than the guy droning on about high tides on your local FM radio station.
While a great number of mash-ups are clearly put together with the sole purpose of providing entertainment and little else, the better ones manage to be extremely useful in the process. Like HousingMaps (.com), an application aching to be replicated in India. It takes postings from free classifieds site Craigslist and combines it with Google Maps to make things radically simpler for those in search of a home. It's easy to use, extremely practical and a lot better than hour-long meetings with oily brokers.
Twitter Answersu00a0 (https://ask.mosio.com/twitter/) harnesses the power of the micro-blogging giant to get you replies to all kinds of questions in a tearing hurry. Beta.twittervision.com lets you track tweets in real time, across a map, and also offers a 3D mode that can be quite compelling -- in other words, avoidable while at work.
One of my personal favourites is MusicMesh (.net), which lets you browse through lists of bands visually, using YouTube. It's a great way to discover new music, or watch performances by artistes you have long admired.
What I appreciate most about mash-ups is their simplicity. They don't require you to have programming skills, and support the visual wiring of graphical user interface widgets. In short, you and your friends can put one
together in the course of a productive afternoon. Thanks to Web applications that now publish APIs, the future of the Internet is in the hands of people like you and me -- we can take it where we want it to go. And we should.
-- Lindsay Pereira is Editor, MiD DAY Online
twitter.com/ lindsay pereira
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