15 Unreasonably Useful Websites

The following is a continuance of my previous article, “15 Ridiculously Useful Websites.” The response to that article was overwhelming. The comments left by those who read it made one thing very clear: the list was incomplete. Although I did not initially write the article with the intention of listing the 15 best sites on the web, that is how my message came across - my fault. I have decided to respond to your comments with a series of follow-on lists containing more useful and entertaining corners of the web. I hope you enjoy them:

1. Musictheory - A grass roots website that contains lessons, trainers, as well as several other utilities.

2. iLike - iLike is a music site where you can organize share and discover new music. There is an iLike side bar available for Windows Media Player as well as iTunes. You can even upload your own music to the site if you would like to.

3. Youtube - This is an obvious one. Watch videos of just about anything for free.

4. Freedocumentaries - This is an awesome catalog of documentaries about many different subjects. You can browse the films by region, theme, or title. The videos are free and are accompanied by a brief description, comments, and sometimes a link to a related page.

5. Buzzillions - Product reviews by consumers who have been verified by the retailer they purchased the item from. You can search for specific items or go through a preference-based menu to find products and reviews that are lined up with your intentions/interests/user level.

6. Craigslist - No matter what you need, chances are, you can probably find it here.

7. Farecast - Farecast provides predictions and trend analysis for airfares and hotel fees. In their own words, “Know When to Buy™: Our airfare prediction shows if fares are rising or dropping. Based on the prediction, we provide a recommendation to buy now or buy later. Know Where to Stay™: Our Rate Key™ indicates whether or not today's rate for a specific hotel is a deal. It compares an individual hotel's current rate found to its observed historical rates.”

8. Download - Offers a central location to find free downloads for subjects ranging from antivirus/firewall to audio/video & gaming software.

9. Pixalo - A great photography site that helps photographers no matter their skill level. It has a community forum were you can get equipment reviews and answers to your questions. The site also offers a free members gallery where you can upload your own photos.

10. Rutomail - This site is full of links to other sites. The links are organized into various categories including business, lifestyle, and Internet, etc...

11. Gyminee - A fitness website that allows you to set goals, track your progress, monitor and plan nutrition, and even invite or find new friends to coordinate with.

12. Roughguides - A pretty good travel website that provides many different ways of researching destinations.

13. Bugmenot - Type in a website that requires a username and password; Bugmenot provides you with a name and password to use…free. Useful for big websites, not really for obscure ones.

14. Wikipedia - Another seemingly obvious site…A user-dependant research site. Wikipedia is very adaptive in that you can cruise through a subject by clicking on embedded links to visit related articles and topics. This allows the researcher to see the topic from many different perspectives.

15. IMDB - Seriously, this is one of the most comprehensive movie information databases on the net. It is very, very thorough.

Torchwood edited versions for the family

 

BBC2 is to screen a specially edited pre-watershed version of Dr Who spin-off Torchwood aimed at younger audiences.
Each episode of the show, which moves to the BBC2 from BBC3 for a second series next year, will be repeated with an edited version that is toned down in terms of its violence to make it more family-friendly.
Its creator Russell T Davies has ruled out removing any scenes involving same-sex relationships.
Speaking today at the launch of the second series, Davies said: “We’ll cut the swearing and cut the violence, but no we will not be cutting the kissing, so no story there.”
BBC2 controller Roly Keating said the decision to repeat each episode with a pre-watershed one was prompted by demand from “families and younger viewers”, adding the move meant “everyone can enjoy the new series”.
When the second run starts next year, the regular cast of Torchwood will be joined by Buffy and Angel star James Marsters.
Other actors lined up to make guest appearances throughout the series, which is filmed in Cardiff, include Alan Dale, Richard Briers and Nerys Hughes.
BBC Wales controller Menna Richards said: “The first series of Torchwood was a huge hit with audiences. We’re extremely proud it’s produced in Wales and its success is a reflection of the huge wealth of talent and creativity that exists here.”
When Torchwood was aired on BBC3 last year it achieved the channel’s highest ratings in 2006, with an audience of 2.5 million for the first episode.

Top 10: Free Video Rippers, Encoders and Converters

 
So many video file formats, so many handheld video players, so many online video sites, and so little time. To have your favorite clips how you want them—whether that's on your DVR, iPod, PSP or desktop—you need the right utility to convert 'em into the format that works for you. Commercial video converter software's aplenty, but there are several solid free utilities that can convert your video files on every operating system, or if you've just got a web browser and a quick clip. Put DVDs on your iPod, YouTube videos on DVD, or convert any video file with today's top 10 free video rippers, encoders and converters.

10. VLC media player (Open source/All platforms)

 
Ok, so VLC is a media player, not converter, but if you're watching digital video, it's a must-have—plus VLC can indeed rip DVD's, as well as play ripped discs in ISO format (no actual optical media required.) VLC can also play FLV files downloaded from YouTube et al, no conversion to AVI required. Since there's a portable version, VLC's a nice choice for getting your DVD rips/saved YouTube video watching on wherever you go.

9. MediaCoder (Open source/Windows)

Batch convert audio and video compression formats with the open source Media Coder for Windows, which works with a long laundry lists of formats, including MP3, Ogg Vorbis, AAC, AAC+, AAC+V2, MusePack, WMA, RealAudio, AVI, MPEG/VOB, Matroska, MP4, RealMedia, ASF/WMV, Quicktime, and OGM, to name a few.

8. Avi2Dvd (Freeware/Windows)

Make your video files burnable to a DVD with Avi2Dvd, a utility that converts Avi/Ogm/Mkv/Wmv/Dvd files to Dvd/Svcd/Vcd format. Avi2Dvd can also produce DVD menus with chapter, audio, and subtitle buttons.

7. Videora Converter (Freeware/Windows only)

Videora Converter is a set of programs, each designed to convert regular PC video files into a format tailored to your favorite video-playing handheld device. The Videora program list includes iPod Video Converter (for 5th gen iPods), iPod classic Video Converter (for 6th gen classic iPods), iPod nano Video Converter (for 3rd gen iPod nanos), iPod touch Video Converter, iPhone Video Converter, Videora Apple TV Converter, PSP Video 9, Videora Xbox360 Converter, Videora TiVo Converter, and Videora PMP Converter.

Honorable Mention: Ares Tube for Windows converts YouTube and other online videos to iPod format.

6. Any Video Converter (Freeware/Windows only)

Convert almost all video formats including DivX, XviD, MOV, rm, rmvb, MPEG, VOB, DVD, WMV, AVI to MPEG-4 movie format for iPod/PSP or other portable video device, MP4 player or smart phone with Any Video Converter, which also supports user-defined video file formats as the output. Batch process multiple files that AVC saves to a pre-selected directory folder, leaving the original files untouched.

5. Hey!Watch (webapp)

Web application Hey!Watch converts video located on your computer desktop as well as clips hosted on video sites. Upload your video to Hey!Watch to encode it into a wide variety of file formats, like H264, MP4, WMV, DivX, HD Video, Mobile 3GP/MP4, iPod, Archos and PSP. Hey!Watch only allows for 10MB of video uploads per month for free, and from there you pay for what you use, but it's got lots of neat features for video publishers like podcast feed generation and automatic batch processing with options you set once.

4. VidDownloader (webapp)

When you don't want to mess with installing software to grab that priceless YouTube clip before it gets yanked, head over to web site VidDownloader which sucks in videos from all the big streaming sites (YouTube, Google Video, iFilm, Blip.TV, DailyMotion, etc.), converts 'em for you to a playable format and offers them for download. Other downloaders for online video sites buy you a Flash FLV file, but VidDownloader spits back an AVI file.

3. iSquint (Freeware/Mac OS X only)

Convert any video file to iPod-sized versions and automatically add the results to your iTunes library. iSquint is free, but readers have praised the pay-for iSquint upgrade, VisualHub, which offers more advanced options for a $23 license fee. Check out the feature comparison chart between iSquint and VisualHub.

2. DVD Shrink (Freeware/Windows only)

Copy a DVD to your hard drive and leave off all the extras like bonus footage, trailers and other extras to save space with DVD Shrink. DVD Shrink utility to rip your DVDs to your hard drive for skip-free video play from scratchy optical media.

Honorable mention: DVD Decrypter (beware of advertisement interstitial page), which Windows peeps can use to copy DVDs to their iPods.

1. Handbrake (Open source/Windows, Mac)

Back up your DVD's to digital file with this open source DVD to MPEG-4 converter app. See also how to rip DVDs to your iPod with Handbrake. 

What's your favorite way to convert video to the right format? Did I miss any good ones in this list? Let me know in the comments.