Spring Cleaning Of the Mind: The Best Online Platforms For A Better You #2

Last week we wrote about online platforms that will make you better (in just about anything), and today we bring you another 10 platforms to boost your personal spring growth. You may have heard about some of them, but even if you had, visit them again. Take this as an incentive.

Codecademy

If you are a programmer, there are slim chances that you haven’t heard about Codecademy. It offers free and interactive coding classes in different programming and markup languages. Doesn’t matter if you are beginner or an advanced coder, it can offer a lot. We encourage you to go and learn few things, because it looks like the internet is here to stay.

Udacity

A spin off from the free computer science classes that were offered through Stanford University, Udacity is a for profit educational organization. It offers massive open online courses (MOOCs) that are project oriented and you can enroll at any time you want. Although it offers a variety of courses, you can still see its mathematic and analytical roots. No art!

RSA Animate

RSA Animate is an animation series from the RSAorg. Shorten from Royal Society of Arts, it is one of the most popular RSA’s presence tools. Excerpts from the events are animated on whiteboard, to make important, socially-beneficial ideas accessible, clear and engaging as possible. First 14 animations have gained over 50 million views, so let’s make that number bigger by one, shall we?

Lynda

Lynda din’t get her name randomly. The site co-founder is Lynda Weinman, who founded her online web site with her husband Bruce Heavin. It evolved from free web resource for Lynda’s students to a site for her books on web design, registration hub for physical classrooms and conferences, and all the way to an online virtual knowledge library. Hello Darwin!

Information Is Beautiful

Information Is Beautiful is an online platform that is literally a beautiful sight for sore eyes. Although words and numbers and charts can provide useful information, sometimes you need a bit more from visual stimuli. This site makes data come alive. The site founder David McCandless has written for Wired and The Guardian and had his work showcased in MoMA in New York.

edX

edX is one of the most famous and most recent MOOC platforms. Founded by MIT and Harvard it has great pedigree and wide variety of courses to take. However, most impressive is the list of universities that are contributing. Besides MIT and Harvard, you can take courses from Berkley, Caltech, Cornell, Columbia, Kyoto, Tokyo, Toronto and many more.

Versal

We presented you with a lot of platforms with courses, but Versal, although still in educational, will help you actually build an interactive course (here called gadget). Still in beta, but very intriguing, it shows huge promise in its field. Mostly focused on teachers, it can help students too. If you want to share your ideas in a form of an online course, this is the platform.

Quora

Give to those who ask and don’t turn away from those who borrow. Quora is place where you can ask anything you want and you will get an answer. Everything is created, answered, edited and organized by users. You suffer from bad luck of never having a chance to ask experts anything? Consider that your luck turned around. Ask, but also answer!

Fora.tv

If you are dying to have a website that gathers unmediated video drawn from live events, lectures and debates from universities, think tanks and conferences, Fora.tv is a place for you. Fora (Latin plural of forum) is a digital forum where you can watch people discuss public affairs, politics and culture, but also see historic speeches and other events.

Nerd Fitness

In the last installment we told how to eat properly, but just in case you overdid it, take a look ar Nerd Fitness. This site gives a geek flavor to exercise and gym, making you a smart bodybuilder or a jock. If you are feeling like a fish out of the water in the local gym, this is your herd. Join in!

And this is it from this two part installment on our blog. Stay tuned for other tips and tutorials, because we’re full of recommendations!