·http://ocw.mit.edu/courses/physics/

The laws of physics have fascinated humans from ancient times to modern day. This OpenCourseWare compilation from MIT brings together dozens of courses that deal with nuclear physics, plasma physics, atomic physics, biophysics, and much more. First-time visitors to the site can browse through the offerings beginning with the famous "Classical Mechanics" course all the way through to "General Relativity.? Additionally, users can view the Featured Courses to explore some of the most recent additions to the site. New visitors to the world of OpenCourseWare should note that these courses include syllabi, lecture notes, assignments, and in some instances, video lectures and other multimedia materials. [KMG]

Back to Contents  |   Back to Top  |

·http://plannersweb.com/

Planners Web is a great way to get acquainted with the field of urban planning as it provides commentary on the rise of the "creative class" and conversations about designing walkable cities. First-time visitors can check out the What's New area to read through compelling articles that include "Ten Things You Should Know About Project Opponents" and "Transportation That Works for All Walks of Life.? Moving on, visitors can look over great sections that cover American planning history ("A is for Automobile to Z is for Zoning?) and The Secrets of Successful Communities. On the top of the homepage, visitors will find sections such as Basic Tools, Planning Topics, and Today's Planning News. Also, visitors may wish to sign up for free email updates. [KMG]

Back to Contents  |   Back to Top  |

·http://ies.jrc.ec.europa.eu/

As one of the seven scientific institutes of the European Commission's Joint Research Centre (JRC), the Institute for Environment and Sustainability (IES) works "to provide scientific and technical support to European Union policies for the protection of the European and global environment." Located in Ispra, Italy its work brings together multidisciplinary teams to create data sets, working papers, and key briefing documents. In the Documentation area, visitors can look over press releases, presentations, and hundreds of papers on everything from tsunami preparedness in the Solomon Islands to sustainable business partnerships. In the Data Portals area visitors can explore a large number of portals that provide information on marine environments, global CO2 emissions, and much more. [KMG]

Back to Contents  |   Back to Top  |

·http://portal.hud.gov/hudportal/HUD?src=/program_offices/administration/handbks_forms

The U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) puts together hundreds of informative documents for policymakers and the general public every year. This site provides access to grant applications, housing discrimination forms, materials on Native American housing programs, and other helpful information. It can be a bit tricky to navigate the site, but scrolling down the site is a good way to get started. Families seeking housing assistance should click on the Homebuying link or look through the Rental Assistance area to get started. Users can also click on the HUD's Client Information Policy Systems (HUDCLIPS) area to quickly search for items of interest. [KMG]

Back to Contents  |   Back to Top  |

·http://www.libraries.psu.edu/psul/digital/palandarch.html

What's the landscape of central Pennsylvania like? This standout archive from the Penn State University Library provides some answers to that query. On this site, visitors can browse the collection of over 1,000 images by location, designer, or building type. Many of the most compelling images here can be found in State College as there are hundreds of photos documenting the main campus of Penn State, along with a range of local businesses, churches, government buildings, and much more. It's a rather impressive collection and visitors can explore almost 400 photos of back yards from around the area. Visitors can create their own cache of images to return to on a future visit. [KMG]

Back to Contents  |   Back to Top  |

·http://jcb.lunaimaging.com/luna/servlet/JCB%7E1%7E1

This collection brings together thousands of images from the John Carter Brown Library at Brown University that tell the story of the colonial Americas. The images date from around 1492 to the 1820s and visitors can browse the collection by category, which include What, Where, Who, and When. The What section has some subcategories that range from the tragic (Accidental Deaths) to those that are more transit-oriented (Stagecoaches). The images here are suitable for use in the classroom and visitors who teach American history, geography, and a range of other subjects will find the materials most useful for providing visual armature to any lecture or discussion. [KMG]

Back to Contents  |   Back to Top  |

·http://resources.wjec.co.uk/

The WJEC site offers up a range of high quality educational resources to support teaching and learning. The resources are offered in both Welsh and English, which is a nice bonus for Welsh-speakers and those learning Welsh. Visitors to the site can scan the Latest Resources to find items that include a set of worksheets and activities related to China under Mao Zedong. The homepage also has a Quick Search that allows visitors to browse the items by subject, such as Welsh, geography, French, and geology. Art and Design is another well developed subject, with five amazing resources that look into the work of Sir Kyffin Williams and the inventive form of recycled figures and forms in sculpture.

Back to Contents  |   Back to Top  |

·http://www.nsf.gov/eng/special/brainpower/

The National Science Foundation (NSF) sponsors a great deal of research on neuroengineering that may affect how we understand conditions such as epilepsy. This website explores some of those innovations and visitors can watch videos and view examples of how different technologies are being used to understand the brain's operations. The site contains five sections, including Exploring the Neuro-realm and Beyond the Brain. Visitors can learn about electronic tattoos that can monitor the brain, heart and muscles, along with remarkable innovations such as artificial retinas and lasers that can manipulate neural signaling. Additionally, the site includes a short video that explores the complexities and promise of brain research through the insights of three engineers. The site is rounded out by a clutch of related websites, including the NSF Understanding the Brain and brainfacts.org. [KMG]

Back to Contents  |   Back to Top  |

·http://www.loc.gov/topics/baseball/

It's spring and baseball season is here. So why not see what the Library of Congress has to say about America's pastime? A great place to start is Baseball History offering important dates and facts, complete with links to primary documents and other items in the Library's collections. After that, navigate to the Baseball Cards, 1887-1914 area. Here you can look over 2,000 cards that document early notables in the game such as Cy Young and Ty Cobb. In the Take Me Out To the Ball Game area visitors can learn about the history of this nostalgic anthem and view the original sheet music. Teachers can find a range of ready-to-use lesson plans, student activities, collection guides and research aids in the aptly titled section, For Teachers. [KMG]

Back to Contents  |   Back to Top  |

·http://dig.lib.niu.edu/cwnewspapers/about.html

Created as part of an ambitious effort to digitize a wide range of documents related to the Civil War in Illinois, this site is a great resource for historians and the curious public. It's quite a trove, as it offers visitors access to over 1,900 documents including commentaries from Senator Stephen Douglas, letters from soldiers back home, the draft, and much more. The site also has a nice search engine that gives visitors the ability to perform a full-text search across all of the articles. Accounts of well known battles in places such as Richmond and Gettysburg can be read through the lenses of small town newspapers in Illinois. Finally, the site also has great links to the rest of the digitization projects at Northern Illinois University. [KMG]

Back to Contents  |   Back to Top  |

·http://digital.lib.buffalo.edu/cdm/landingpage/collection/BIO001

For folks studying evolutionary biology, this collection from the University of Buffalo's Teaching and Learning Center is a gem. The site contains materials that cover sixteen different animals in a form that resembles a digital image narrative. Visitors can view multiple, fully labeled external and internal views and details of each animal. These materials were developed by Professor Clyde F. Herreid and a team of librarians, graduate student assistants and other staff. Users can browse around by subject heading (such as grasshoppers) or they can also search the entire collection. Each specimen is very well marked and it's a great way to learn about the world of evolutionary biology. [KMG]

Back to Contents  |   Back to Top  |

·http://digitalcollections.missouristate.edu/cdm4/browse.php?CISOROOT=/rt66

The folks at Missouri State University have interviewed a range of business owners along the celebrated Route 66 to tell the amazing story of what life was like living along this American landmark. Visitors can read through interviews with a variety of people, including the long-time owner of the Boots Motel in Carthage, Missouri and Sheldon and Julia Chaney, owner of a popular gas station. It's the type of popular oral history that makes for excellent reading and contemplation. They plan on adding more material in the future, so curious visitors would do well to make return visits to see what's added next. [KMG]

Back to Contents  |   Back to Top  |

·http://www.library.unh.edu/digital/maps-atlases

From Durham to Dover, this collection of New Hampshire maps and atlases is a real find for geographers and those who love cartography in general. Items here include the 1892 Hurd Town and City Atlas of New Hampshire, an 1878 atlas of New Hampshire geology, and a remarkable 1717 Gazetter of the State of New Hampshire compiled by Eliphalet and Phinehas Merrill. The site also contains 1,100 historic USGS maps of New England and the Hurd Town and City Atlas is a great way to explore the historical development of small towns across the state. Users can browse by county and visitors can zoom in and out of items to get a closer look at roads and various improvements. [KMG]

Back to Contents  |   Back to Top  |

·http://faraday.physics.utoronto.ca/GeneralInterest/Harrison/Flash/

If you would like a taste of classical mechanics in an animated form, this website is right up your alley. This site from the physics department at the University of Toronto offers up over 100 helpful animations that cover quantum mechanics, vectors, waves, relativity, and optics. Visitors can scroll through the topical headings to look for items of interest and should note the entire website is searchable as well. There are some great topical animations here, such as one on fluid mechanics that involves a theoretical dropping of a ball from the CN Tower in Toronto. Animations have also been translated into Catalan, Spanish, and Basque. [KMG]

Back to Contents  |   Back to Top  |

·https://cache.kzoo.edu/handle/10920/26

Photo collections are a great way to visibly document the story of colleges and universities. This collection from Kalamazoo College covers every aspect of the school's past, including ribbon cuttings and formal events. Currently, the site contains over three hundred photographs and visitors can view them by date or subject. The best way to get started is by looking over the Recent Submissions. Here, visitors will find students aboard ships as part of a classroom experience, faculty teaching, and Kalamazoo's beautiful campus. [KMG]

Back to Contents  |   Back to Top  |

·http://exhibitions.nypl.org/cassatt/

In 2013, the New York Public Library put on an exhibition of prints, in a variety of mediums, created by Mary Cassatt between 1878 to 1898. The show began with Cassatt's first attempts at printmaking, and "culminates with her highly accomplished and technically dazzling color prints.? The prints gathered for the exhibition can still be viewed online at this website from NYPL, although not in the same arrangement as existed in the exhibition. The exhibition brochure is available online, to recreate that arrangement and provide explanatory text, as well as a glossary of printmaking terms. [DS]

Back to Contents  |   Back to Top  |

·http://optimizilla.com/

Billed as the "ultimate image optimization tool,? Optimizilla is designed to help transform images quickly with little fuss. Visitors can upload up to 20 files in JPEG or PNG formats and then use the slider to control the compression level. It's simple and users can just click and drag files to get started. This version is compatible with all operating systems. [KMG]

Back to Contents  |   Back to Top  |

·http://www.ooberdocs.com/

Ooberdocs helps interested parties link their email to Dropbox seamlessly. After signing up, visitors will be able to have a copy of incoming email attachments sent directly into a corresponding Dropbox account. Also, visitors can sign up to receive alerts via text or email when these attachments have been successfully sent. This version is compatible with all operating systems. [KMG]

Back to Contents  |   Back to Top  |

Google Must Delete Personal Data When Asked, European Court Says
http://www.npr.org/blogs/thetwo-way/2014/05/13/312125549/google-must-delete-personal-data-when-asked-european-court-says

EU Court: Google Must Amend Some Search Results After E.U. Ruling
http://time.com/97272/google-results-eu-right-to-be-forgotten/

In Google case, E.U. court says people are entitled to control their own online histories
http://m.washingtonpost.com/business/technology/eu-court-people-entitled-to-control-own-online-histories/2014/05/13/8e4495d6-dabf-11e3-8009-71de85b9c527_story.html

Google: Privacy Policy
http://www.google.com/policies/privacy/

Electronic Frontier Foundation: Privacy
https://www.eff.org/issues/privacy

Disconnect
https://disconnect.me

When it comes to online privacy, things got much more interesting this Tuesday when the European Court of Justice ruled that Google must delete personal data when asked to do so. The case was brought by a Spaniard who said that a Google search of his name brought up an auction notice of his repossessed home from 16 years ago. In its decision, the European court remarked that people should be allowed to erase their digital footprint, referring to the decision as ?the right to be forgotten." Responding to the matter, Google noted that they only rely on material that's already freely available online. However, this is not the first time Google has had to modify its practices in Europe. The company previously agreed to modify the way it displays search results as part of a deal to end a probe by the European Union's antitrust body. [KMG]

The first link will take visitors to a post on this recent decision from NPR's Bill Chappell, writing for the Two-Way breaking news site. Moving on, the second link will take users to an article from Time that also reports on the court's decision. The third link will take interested parties to a fine piece from the Tech corner of the Washington Post website about the detailed findings and judgements from the court's decision. The fourth link will take visitors to Google's official privacy policy and the fifth link will take users to the Electronic Frontier Foundation's page on its own research into online privacy. The last link will take curious visitors to a helpful app that will allow them to browse without being monitored by various tracking systems.