Useful Links - MBToolBox

Mini Reference Shelf 12.28.06

Claire — Thu, 28 Dec 2006 16:27:33 +0000

via sree
The new 100 most useful sites
Top 100 Education Blogs
And something practical at Lifehacker: Downloading Spamfighter.

New Career Opportunities Daily: The best jobs in media.

Reference Shelf 12.21.06

Claire — Thu, 21 Dec 2006 14:41:27 +0000

From the Journalist’s Toolbox: 2006 Year-in-Review: Many of you are working on year-ender stories, so we’ll be adding links to this in the next few days. Some sites that may be of help in summarizing top news stories for the year: CNN’s Year-in-Review, ESPN’s top sports stories of the year, MSNBC’s top health stories and JibJab.com’s year-in-review parody.
A few from Sree, like high tech gifts under $100, FauxTo, a beta-stage web-based Photo-shop-type program and Google Patent Search
AutoCrit identifies the weak areas in your manuscript. Check your work before you submit and increase your chances of getting published. (I don’t know how well it works–anyone used this?)
A little more gift-giving advice: a red wine gift guide at Lifehacker. Bonus from Lifehacker: how to get quoted in the news.
Move Over, Sobol: There’s Another Big-Money Contest in Town (Writer Beware)
Finally, do you live in New York and are interested in travel writing? Check out some of the classes listed by the Written Road.

New Career Opportunities Daily: The best jobs in media.

Reference Shelf 12.12.06

Claire — Tue, 12 Dec 2006 16:57:22 +0000

A bunch of suggested gifts for writers at the Written Road. In addition to that, the Booksling--possibly good for book critics and students. And a related tip from Susan Kirkland: “Before your readers do their Christmas shopping, they may be interested in the “small print details of Microsoft’s ZUNE digital music player. It’s a high price to pay for a three- day permission on each song downloaded or beamed, even if it’s a song you wrote, sung and own. Besides, it may take you longer than three days to find someone else who owns a ZUNE to beam to.”

Holiday Trends: The Journalist’s Toolbox has resources on holiday business trends and dangerous toys/child safety. There are also travel tips, food, and holiday box office links on the miscellaneous page.
LIRIPIPE – The long tail on a graduate’s academic hood. More where these came from at 33 Names of Things You Never Knew Had Names.
This guide to winning an argument amuses me. And it might actually be helpful. I bet you could win a Presidential debate with these tips.
And in silly little amusements:
“The little boat gently drifted across the pond exactly the way a bowling ball wouldn’t.” Worst analogies ever written in a high school essay.
Wordie: Like Flickr, but without the photos. Doesn’t that sound fun?

New Career Opportunities Daily: The best jobs in media.

11.28.06 Reference Shelf

Claire — Tue, 28 Nov 2006 15:34:44 +0000

Some hopefully helpful links for you today. A few are holiday related, like Lifehacker’s recommendation of Make’s open source gift guide (good for givers on a budget.) Or, too busy working to go to somebody’s lame holiday party? Use the excuse generator from Enlighten. Want some cool gifts for writers? The chicks at the Renegade Writer love the stuff from See Jane Work.
The Journalist’s Toolbox has resources on holiday business trends and dangerous toys/child safety. There are also travel tips, food, and holiday box office links on the miscellaneous page.
And a few that just aren’t really related to anything:
From the BBC, script formats for scriptwriters (might be different for US writers, though.)
Writer Unboxed has listed several sites that can be used to inspire or break writers block, so check them out.

New Career Opportunities Daily: The best jobs in media.

Reference Shelf: 11.21.06

Claire — Tue, 21 Nov 2006 12:30:02 +0000

Design writers looking for a few resources: The Journalist’s Toolbox has an area devoted to it.
Via Sree, 50 great blogging resources.
Tips and ideas for science fiction writers here.
Having trouble focusing? How to concentrate on writing, over at Bad Language.
And Mac users, want to help your workflow? Lifehacker shows you how with tips on enabling Speech Recognition.

New Career Opportunities Daily: The best jobs in media.

Reference Shelf 11.17.06

Claire — Fri, 17 Nov 2006 13:26:37 +0000

Links and such for writers and editors of all kinds.
Are you going to be taking an editing test and have no idea how to study? Check out the archived editing tests from the Dow Jones Newspaper Fund.
Wondering how to create a book proposal? Find a model here at Textbook Template.
Want to write but hate thinking up a plot and characters on your own? Check out storybase.net, “the world’s only taxonomy of essential human situations. This is an updated, online beta version of Storybase Software for Writers, used worldwide for inspiration and reference by screenwriters, novelists, playwrights, writers of interactive games, memoirists, ad creatives and many others who need to tell a compelling story.”
At Lifehacker: Community web site Wesabe lets users share their financial experiences with the hope that doing so will help them make better financial decisions to meet their goals.
Whether you need it or it just makes you hot, Grammar Girl is here to help you with your, you know, grammar. She sort of looks like Wonkette’s cousin.

New Career Opportunities Daily: The best jobs in media.

Reference Shelf: 11.7.06

Claire — Tue, 07 Nov 2006 12:47:58 +0000

A few links that might help you on this fine day:
The Journalist’s Toolbox Political Blogs recommendations: Track what people are saying and writing heading into the elections. A few sites that can help: Andrew Sullivan’s Daily Dish, PowerLine, Captain’s Quarters, and Reason magazine’s Hit & Run.
Zotero [zoh-TAIR-oh] “is a free, easy-to-use Firefox extension to help you collect, manage, and cite your research sources.”
Related: reader’s tips for building bibliographies at Lifehacker.
From Sree: gotta stop wasting time with needy friends or telemarketers? Sorrygottago, which gives you sounds to help you get off the phone.

New Career Opportunities Daily: The best jobs in media.

Reference Shelf: 10.31.06

Claire — Tue, 31 Oct 2006 11:43:48 +0000

The spookiest and most useful links I could find today:
“CCleaner optimizes your PC by removing various kinds of system detritus, such as temp files, old Registry entries, and invalid shortcuts. It also helps promote privacy by deleting your browser’s URL history, cookies, and so on.” (Lifehacker)
An online phrase thesaurus: “Enter a word and it will generate a list of phrases and sayings related to that word – often including interesting selections that you may not have anticipated.”
You’ve enjoyed a poorly worded or ripoff Craigslist help wanted ad or two before. Now find them all under one roof.
And finally, on this fine fine day, I present the Dark Erotica blog: Tips, Tricks, Rants and Raves on the Secrets to Writing Erotic Fiction

New Career Opportunities Daily: The best jobs in media.

Reference Shelf 10.24.06

Claire — Tue, 24 Oct 2006 15:08:27 +0000

Senate, House, gubenatorial and local elections are coming in early November and the Journalist’s Toolbox overflows with resources. “One helpful site is FollowtheMoney.org, which tracks campaign finance donations. There are more campaign finance sites and election resources in the Elections, State Government, Federal Government and Expert Sources sections. If you’re doing a story on political campaign ads, you’ll find resources in the Advertising section.”
Book fairs: not as cool as Lollapalooza, but cooler than Renaissance fairs. (Library of Congress)
Quickie from Ask Metafilter on how to cite a video game.
Sree is proud of his list of free software alternatives, and hopes you like it too.
I’ll end this post with more on When to Quit, from Scott Young.

New Career Opportunities Daily: The best jobs in media.

Crowded Inbox?

Claire — Fri, 20 Oct 2006 14:20:22 +0000

Upod‘s David Hochman found this tool, which he says sounds neat, but NB neither of us have used it enough to ‘officially’ endorse it:

continued…

New Career Opportunities Daily: The best jobs in media.

Reference Shelf 10.17.06

Claire — Tue, 17 Oct 2006 16:09:09 +0000

Are you burned up that you didn’t publish the hard-hitting articles on “man dates” and “girl crushes” and “wingmen”? Check BuzzWhack for the latest stupid temporarily culturally relevant buzzwords.
Dreaming of a new job? Too lazy to actually apply? Or are you really into employment as a topic in general? What Would Dad Say, a blog via jobdig, with some interesting interviews and articles about, well, jobs.
The Complete Nobody’s Guide to Query Letters. Quick and dirty, not touchy-feely.
Via Sreetips: Google just for educators. Who says teachers get no respect? They get their own Google!
Do you have a spouse or friend who you turn to for computer advice and you both get mad at each other for your failure to comprehend his or her instructions? Go to LogMeIn, so you can actually see what you’re doing wrong. (via Lifehacker)
And finally, just for fun, classy insults. Perfect for when you want to zing someone and they won’t even realize it until days later.

New Career Opportunities Daily: The best jobs in media.

ProfNet 3.0 Updates

Claire — Mon, 16 Oct 2006 09:37:05 +0000

ProfNet has made some changes and updates, and to keep you abreast of them, ProfNet President Dan Forbush has been keeping a blog of the developments here, where presumably you can also post questions and comments.

New Career Opportunities Daily: The best jobs in media.

Reference Shelf 10.10.06

Claire — Tue, 10 Oct 2006 15:05:26 +0000

This writing sample analyzer can’t tell you if your writing is any good, but it might be helpful for those of you trying to get an idea of the consistency (or variety) of your syntax.
From Lifehacker: “Make free international phone calls sans Skype with Futurephone, a company that’s just got to be bleeding money.”
Also from Lifehacker, some useful Microsoft Word shortcuts.
Need to convert some files? Do it here for free (via Sree.)
Feel like the job application sites you use don’t keep you organized enough? Isabont lets you see the status of your resumes and other relevant documents as you look for new jobs.
Interesting search tool with Kosmix, which takes what you’re searching for and organizes it into various categories.

New Career Opportunities Daily: The best jobs in media.

Reference Shelf 10.5.06

Claire — Thu, 05 Oct 2006 13:37:19 +0000

It’s not a fun topic but the Journalist’s Toolbox has references on school violence. A little bit more on this topic at the Buzzmachine.
Got a job interview coming up? Don’t give the dead fish handshake. (Lifehacker)
Via Sree: Want to ~~clutter~~ spiff up your webpage? Google toys to add.
Me no good at math. You? Meet Dr. Calculator.
Looking for podcasts on writing, editing, publishing, blogging? Search for them via Pluggd.

New Career Opportunities Daily: The best jobs in media.

Reference Shelf 9.21.06

Claire — Thu, 21 Sep 2006 15:19:32 +0000

Helpful, timely, and sometimes silly links to help the writer or editor:
Freeware & Online Tools for Writers, courtesy of the Paperback Writer.
Journalist’s Toolbox has a whole bunch of links related to Food Safety for those of you covering tainted spinach and its ilk.
Sent to me by Susan Kirkland: “want to find out who sent you those irritating slabs of SPAM? This is a nifty tool that will track them down no matter what the header says is the last server to dish it up.”
5 Simple Ways to Open Your Blog Post With a Bang at Copyblogger.
How to explain RSS the Oprah way at the Back in Skinny Jeans blog. I cannot endorse skinny jeans but anything that makes Real Simple Syndication simpler is good by me.

New Career Opportunities Daily: The best jobs in media.