Thanks to Mary in Minneapolis for sending me info on a very fun widget (small web application) – StoryMaps: http://outside.in.

In you like to look at things on the web, it’s a fun site to visit to get news from your town or neighborhood. (I learned that the Vatican is bringing artifacts to the MN History Center.) You don’t need to sign up; just visit and it will know where you are. (You can sign up to get email updates.)

If you have a blog, you can sign up to have StoryMaps crawl through your site and create a map that marks areas you have talked about. It’s cool. Sadly, it doesn’t seem to work with WordPress, which is the blog tool I tend to use but here’s a sample map from my Family Blog: http://outside.in/maps/6482

I really like it in St Paul – I would have loved it in Dublin. It’s a fun tool for any placebloggers.