Wordle.net

I came across this web site, called Wordle.net (http://wordle.net/). It's a pretty amazing little site, that allows you to create tag clouds (or 'word clouds' as the site calls them) on the fly. Just enter a bunch of words into the site, or give it a URL, and it will give you back a fully formatted cloud that you can then use as you see fit - on your site for instance. The other really cool thing about it is that once you've created your cloud, you can then reformat it as many times as you want; everything from fonts to color schemes can be modified.

So I took all of the posts (so far, not including this one, of course) and created a tag cloud. I then 'randomized' the design a couple of times, and came up with the following clouds (all images courtesy of http://wordle.net/):











One of the things that I noticed when I looked at the clouds that were created, is that I really, really, really use the word 'really' way too much (and I have to admit, that it was so apparent that my 10 year-old daughter noticed it too when I explained to her what a tag cloud was). It actually looks like I use it more than any other word. My freshman English professor must be getting a severe case of heartburn, as she never let us repeat a word in any essay we did for her (wish I could remember her name, as she was the one who actually taught me how to write well - at least I think I write well). [Note: I had to go back and edit that last sentence, and take the word 'really' out. Twice.]

But the truly best part of the story is the story of how this site was created. You see, its creator, Jonathan Feinberg, works for IBM. And he created the main algorithms that the site uses on IBM's time. And, it seems that that's ok with IBM. I mean he talks about it right on the site. True, he does work for IBM Research. But still. If IBM is allowing their employees to do non-IBM work and create something based on it that is outside of the scope of their day jobs (a somewhat Google thing to do, imho), maybe there is hope that corporate America is moving in the right direction in keeping competitive.

Then again, it might be just a really cool little site. Really cool. Really.