We've been a bit preoccupied here at TBG with the emergence of a new crop political websites.  Taking a break from politics,  here's a quick roundup of some nifty little Web apps that I found recently. 

Visual Page Rank

• Ever wonder what links get the most traffic on your webpage or blog?  When you type your URL into Visual page rank, this tool shows your the Google PageRank for your site and all the links you provide.

TeleFlip

• This program allows you to send messages from a computer to any cell phone.  You just type in the recipient's cell phone number, followed by @teleflip.com, into any email program, then type a brief message.  The recipient gets your email as a text message.  I tried this out with my own cell phone, and it only took about 7 seconds for the message to reach my phone.

TagMaps

• This service combines Yahoo! Maps with Flickr.  Just type in a location and float your mouse over a spot on the map, and any Flickr pictures tagged with that location show up on the right hand side of the map.  Here's a search for Washington DC.  You can also embed TagMaps in your blog.

3-D Digg

• View and surf Digg stories in 3-D flash.  Honestly, I'm not exactly sure what the point of this is or how it works, but it is pretty cool nonetheless.

Shelfari

• Social networking meets books.  This sort of reminds me of the networking functionality on Netflix, only with books instead of movies.

iJigg

• Digg meets music.  On this site, you can listen to, vote on, and share songs, but don't expect to download them.  You can only listen on the iJigg site.