Well, it's been an intense week here at One Week | One Tool, but we've built something, and it works! We're proud to announce the launch of Serendip-o-matic, the serendipity engine where your sources are your search.
The idea is simple: we wanted to restore some of that serendipity-in-the-stacks feeling to the digital research process. As historians, we're used to keyword or subject searching for materials, but with Serendip-o-matic, you can use your own materials — whether a web page, a bibliography, your CV, a paper you've written, or an article you like — as your query. Serendip-o-matic processes your text, extracts a random set of key terms, and returns results from the collections at the Digital Public Library of America, Europeana, and Flickr Commons. Try it for yourself and see what you get. It's pretty fun.
You can watch the video of our live launch broadcast at One Week | One Tool.
