This is one of my favorite geek tricks ever.
Here’s how it goes:
- You’re browsing Amazon.
- You find a book you want.
- You click a bookmarklet in your browser window.
- The bookmarklet looks up to see if that book is available at your local public library.
- If it is — and you’re in Austin — you can get the book held and sent to your local branch. (Transfer usually takes a few days, and they’re nice enough to send you an email when it gets there.)
The key is this sucker:
Drag that link to your bookmarks toolbar. It’s a bookmarklet — like a bookmark, but also kind of like an application. Then go to Amazon (or any place else that has ISBN numbers in the url), and try it out. … Here’s a book.
Neat, right?
Coolness courtesy of Jon Udell. If you live someplace else, you can go to his site and try to find or roll your own.
