Good morning all,

I’m thrilled to share a site with you today that came to my attention via the site owners themselves. I get emails all the time from people asking me to blog about their site. I rarely comply, unless the resource is free, high quality, easy to use, and compelling. Explore.org is all of those things … and more.

Explore.org is an Annenberg-funded, “non-profit, multi-media organization that documents leaders around the world who have devoted their lives to extraordinary causes. Both educational and inspirational, explore creates a portal into the soul of humanity by championing the selfless acts of others.”

The site captures and shares powerful videos and high-quality photographs. It just launched. It has about 200 videos and thousands of photos, all in an easy-to use interface that lets you search by a range of places and causes. You can literally spend hours here.

Here’s a great example. Check out Street Poets (warning: the audio track has occasional mild profanity):

Yes, those videos are in HD. Yes, that’s a download link you see. I’m a little confused by that though because the site’s Terms of Service seem to indicate the content can be shared / linked to / embedded but it can’t be remixed (see: USE OF SITE; SUBMISSIONS). How about a little Creative Commons love here, folks? kthxbai…

The photos section is equally compelling. Just look at this picture. Does it speak to you? It speaks to me…

The descriptions provide explanations and all the relevant background. Buttons on the bottom of each media element provide links to related content – videos, discussions, research, and even an interactive map (which unfortunately didn’t seem to be working when I tried it.)

Again, this content is also easily downloadable and would, in my view, be perfect in a wide range of digital projects, which as we all know are even more powerful when shared online. A point, one could argue, should be especially appreciated by the folks behind Explore.org!

Hope this helps!

-kj-